Political prisoner, activist, journalist, hymn-writer, emerging thinktanker, aspiring novelist, "tribal elder", 2019 parliamentary candidate for North West Durham, Shadow Leader of the Opposition, "Speedboat", "The Cockroach", eagerly awaiting the second (or possibly third) attempt to murder me.
Saturday, 11 November 2006
No "Son and Heir" There
Thursday afternoon saw me at a very good conference, also attended by several luminaries of the Dear Leader's Sedgefield Constituency Labour Party, including the Chairman of that august body, who was telling everyone within earshot to vote for John McDonnell for Labour Leader, and bemoaning McDonnell's failure to arrange a campaign meeting in Ferryhill. Everyone there from that CLP (although they weren't there in that capacity) was adamant that they never saw Tony Blair at all; and they were all having absolutely none of the persistent rumour of "Euan Blair, the Son and Heir". On the contrary, they were implaccable in their insistence on a local candidate, specifically citing their last 23 years' experience of a London MP as their reason for that insistence.
I don't know how many times I have to tell you that I haven't been (there was yet another members' communication in my inbox even this morning). Perhaps I should have been, but we'll never know, since they are too incompetent to know what they are doing, and their moment has well and truly passed on this one.
ReplyDeleteAnd even if I were, I'd still have two votes in the Leadership and Deputy Leadership Elections; I just wouldn't have three any more. However, I fully expect that third ballot paper to arrive.
Anyway, beyond having paid a full year's subscription, why should I care? Even people who have been in the Party for several decades, through thick(ish) and very thin indeed, simply shrug their shoulders and say that they will be "well and truly retired" when it ceases to exist, as, like everyone else, they fully expect it to do within the next 10 years, and probably well within the next 10 years.
The same is true of the Tories, of course. So the question now is what replaces them, and thus also what, by a series of defaults, replaces the Lib Dems.
Get over the Labour Party! I certainly have, and so has everyone (yes, everyone) I know.