Tuesday 25 June 2019

The Next Generation

And so the 67-year-old Jim Fitzpatrick announces that he will not contest a General Election 25 years after he was first elected. Cue howling about purges in certain quarters, and gloating about purges in certain other quarters. But the reality is that people who had first been elected in 1997, when they were generally in their late thirties or in their forties, were always going to retire in some numbers in 2022.

They were representative enough of where the Labour Party was in the mid-Nineties, and their successors will be representative of where the Labour Party is today. No purges are necessary, only the natural course of events. Alas, though, there are less than ideal qualities to the Labour Party of today, even if they do not begin to approach the failings of the Labour Party in the PFI-and-wars years.

Another hung Parliament is coming, however, and we need our people to hold the balance of power in it. A new party will be registered before the House of Commons rises for the summer recess, even if I have to pay for it myself, ongoing lawfare or no ongoing lawfare.

And I will stand for Parliament here at North West Durham even if I can raise only the deposit, which I could do by going pretty overdrawn, although that was not how I was brought up. I would still prefer to raise the £10,000 necessary to mount a serious campaign, but I am no longer making my candidacy conditional on having done so. In any event, please email davidaslindsay@hotmail.com. Very many thanks.

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