#WhyAyeWeCan

I am not a fan of directly elected mayors.

But my friend Jamie Driscoll, who turns out to be about 10 years older than I had always assumed him to have been, is now the front runner for the Labour nomination to become the Mayoral candidate in what we are now supposed to call "North of Tyne".

He is on the brink of defeating the Hard Right Leader of Newcastle City Council, Nick "Slasher" Forbes, who is also the Leader of the Local Government Association's Labour Group.

For remember that we already know what the Labour Right would look like in power, since it already runs almost the whole of Labour local government. And that is not a pretty sight.

Slasher's defeat by Jamie is exactly what is needed by everyone concerned.