And so the Labour Party reinstates Jared O'Mara, who has never been suspended from the House of Commons, yet who has still yet to make his maiden speech. Like Ben Bradley, O'Mara would never have been a parliamentary candidate if his party had had any expectation of winning the seat.
O'Mara is one of Momentum's first two MPs. Labour had only ever come third at Sheffield Hallam, but Momentum poured people in, both from within and from well beyond the Labour Party, and unexpectedly unseated Nick Clegg, leapfrogging the Conservatives, with little or no assistance from the regional or national Labour Party as such.
The other such MP is Laura Pidcock. North West Durham had always been a Labour seat, and the Constituency Labour Party had nominated Ed Miliband in 2010, Andy Burnham in 2015, and Jeremy Corbyn in 2016, so it was far from right-wing these days.
Yet Pidcock was imposed with absolutely no local participation whatever, and no one of any local distinction signed her nomination papers. The CLP barely campaigned for her. Instead, from all over the place, the Labour and non-Labour Far Left turned up in droves. They now form Pidcock's endlessly astonishing entourage.
Yet Pidcock was imposed with absolutely no local participation whatever, and no one of any local distinction signed her nomination papers. The CLP barely campaigned for her. Instead, from all over the place, the Labour and non-Labour Far Left turned up in droves. They now form Pidcock's endlessly astonishing entourage.
Meanwhile, people come up to me and ask when I am going to get rid of her. Seriously. I now get this at least every other day.
Everyone. People whom I have not seen in 20 years. People whom I have no memory of ever having met, still less could I tell you their names. People who have been in the Labour Party since the 1960s, and who in some cases stopped speaking to me when I left it. Everyone.
And everywhere. In the street. In the Post Office. At the bus stop. On the bus. In the library. In church. Everywhere.
But enough of that. For now. When is there going to be justice for Kelvin Hopkins, who was the first MP to nominate Corbyn for Leader, and who is a staunch left-wing Brexiteer? Hopkins remains in limbo. Unlike O'Mara, who is at most a kind of fashionably Corbynista person rather than a serious politician of the Left.
Apparently, someone is sitting as an MP while too weak to tell Hopkins to cease and desist from sending her his billets-doux. If he has done anything, then he has done that: he has kept sending sweet nothings to a person who could not find it within herself to tell him to stop, despite regarding herself as capable of legislating for the rest of us, and despite regarding herself as capable of holding the Government to account.
But enough of that. For now. When is there going to be justice for Kelvin Hopkins, who was the first MP to nominate Corbyn for Leader, and who is a staunch left-wing Brexiteer? Hopkins remains in limbo. Unlike O'Mara, who is at most a kind of fashionably Corbynista person rather than a serious politician of the Left.
Apparently, someone is sitting as an MP while too weak to tell Hopkins to cease and desist from sending her his billets-doux. If he has done anything, then he has done that: he has kept sending sweet nothings to a person who could not find it within herself to tell him to stop, despite regarding herself as capable of legislating for the rest of us, and despite regarding herself as capable of holding the Government to account.
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