Direction – Social Democracy

Oh, how convinced the official media are that Robert Fico had it coming. And notice that their preferred politicians have flocked to Tbilisi from half a dozen other countries to lead marches against Georgia's foreign agents law. If that law is "Russian-style", then it is also "American-style", and in fact very tame by that standard.

It is also "British-style", since we have changed the law to protect even two small circulation newspapers and a tiny circulation magazine from acquisition by the wrong sort of Abroad. The same knives are now out for Sir Paul Marshall, this time because of his faith, so who would be permitted to buy the Telegraph titles and The Spectator? And notice whose decision that is. Imagine that that were how it worked in Russia. Or Georgia. Or Slovakia.

But when I tell you that there is going to be a hung Parliament, then you can take that to the bank. I spent the 2005 Parliament saying that it was psephologically impossible for the Heir to Blair's Conservative Party to win an overall majority. I predicted a hung Parliament on the day that the 2017 General Election was called, and I stuck to that, entirely alone, all the way up to the publication of the exit poll eight long weeks later. And on the day that Rishi Sunak became Prime Minister, I predicted that a General Election between him and Keir Starmer would result in a hung Parliament.

I have no plan to join the Workers Party of Britain, although nor would I expect to stand against it. But if it did not contest North Durham, then I would. To strengthen families and communities by securing economic equality and international peace through the democratic political control of the means to those ends, including national and parliamentary sovereignty, we need to hold the balance of power. Owing nothing to either main party, we must be open to the better offer. But there does need to be a better offer. Not a lesser evil, which in any case the Labour Party is not. We have made a start.