Absolute Hodgepodge, Indeed

"In the weeks of the Carrick case coming out, I had to talk down from a ledge a number of different rape victims who were being supported by the Met from pulling out because they felt unsafe," Jess Phillips told the Today programme. Phillips is the MP for Birmingham Yardley. Either she is lying, or there is something highly questionable going on.

As ever with Phillips. For eight years, she has been sold as having come from the Left, even to the point of having left the Labour Party over Iraq. Yet no one who has supported her failed attempts to get onto the ballot for Leader would have given anyone like that the time of day.

I tried to talk George Galloway into contesting her seat last time. Even if he had not been the First Past the Post, and he very well might have been, then nor would she. Instead, he was left standing against a man who had announced at the last moment that he was retiring anyway. No one has ever described Phillips as retiring. But we are where we are.

And we are heading for a hung Parliament. 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. There does, however, need to be a better offer. Not a lesser evil, which in any case the Labour Party is not.