North of Tyne Mayor Jamie Driscoll, who quit the Labour Party to stand as an Independent, has provided useful advice to his former political home – and it is good.
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You may have missed it among the torrent of opinions on Israel and Gaza, so here it is:
I would like to see @UKLabour say it’s going to end destitution in 5 years. We’ve got working people using food banks. Children are going hungry. My politics is simple. Britain should be run in the interests of the people who do the work. @PoliticsJOE_UK#PoliticsJoe@AvaSantinapic.twitter.com/bGLgDHtvk1
Promise to end destitution within five years and the election is won.
It’s a valid point, isn’t it?
The question is: why won’t Keir Starmer do it? Is he too heavily in thrall to big business by now?
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Over to our on-the-spot (he’s somewhere green) correspondent for a quick rundown of all the facts you need to know about Rishi Sunak’s new North Sea oil and gas drilling contracts:
(I thought you might enjoy this before I get festive about Sunak with an article about how upset the Tories have got about a photoshopped image of him handing over a badly-poured pint of beer – contrasted with the fact that they created a mechanism for pumping out lies about themselves. Coming soon!)
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It should come as no surprise to anybody that the oil and gas contracts Rishi Sunak announced in the middle of a global boiling crisis come with a suggestion of corruption.
Remember Infosys, the firm owned by Sunak’s father-in-law, in which his wife Akshata Murty has 38.9 million shares? The information on my screen says they’re estimated to be worth £89 million but that is likely to increase hugely now.
You see, Infosys has just “won” (it says here) a $1.5 billion contract with BP – one of the energy firms that will profit from those North Sea oil and gas contracts. People are suggesting that there’s something fishy about it all, and it isn’t just the water:
Infosys already has ties with Shell, as part of a partnership with “two of the top five integrated oil and gas companies, three of the top four oilfield services providers, and five of the top 10 upstream enterprises across the oil and gas landscape”:
Rishi Sunak's family's business Infosys boasts of its partnership with "two of the top five integrated oil and gas companies, three of the top four oilfield services providers, and five of the top 10 upstream enterprises across the oil and gas landscape.”https://t.co/JGWQiIGljspic.twitter.com/VPiKDthqar
The Byline Times article – from July 19 last year – warned us about Sunak’s ties with the fossil fuel industry:
Infosys’ intimate partnerships with regional as well as global oil and gas giants represent a potential conflict of interest for Rishi Sunak.
According to the UK Ministerial Code, ministers are required to fully disclose and explain the business interests of their spouses and families “which might give rise to a conflict” with the duties of Government.
Despite Sunak ostensibly committing to the Government’s net zero goals – now deemed unlawful by the High Court for not going far enough – he also said in the televised debate … that Britain must not move “too hard and too fast” on climate action.
His victory [in the Conservative leadership contest that was ongoing at the time] could represent a win for firms like Shell, which said it expected to revise upwards the value of oil and gas assets it had previously written down, triggering a jump in share prices.
When Sunak eventually released a list of his business interests – correct me if I’m wrong – the connections between his wife’s family firm and the oil companies that have just won very large and valuable contracts were not mentioned.
Scottish news organisation The National has also – just – published a list of fossil fuel polluters and climate change deniers that donate money to the Conservative Party. Have some of these won contracts in Sunak’s recent bonanza?
The Tory donors with links to fossil fuel interests and climate denial – see the list https://t.co/mtnrzjU8h5 Worth looking at
Taking it in the round, it seems unlikely that Sunak had the interests of the eco-system in mind when he was considering the possibility of new oil and gas contracts in the North Sea.
Indeed, it seems unlikely that he considered the well-being of anything other than his own financial affairs and those of his family.
It seems to This Writer that this entire situation – the contracts, the Business Council, the donations to the Tory Party – requires scrutiny, and by somebody entirely independent of Sunak and his Tories.
Can anybody recommend a mechanism by which this can be secured?
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I’ve decided to resign from @UKLabour and serve as an Independent Mayor.
People are tired of being controlled by Westminster and Party HQs. They want someone to stand up for them. Let the people decide. £25k by end of Aug & I’ll stand as North East Mayor👉https://t.co/WuDEGd3xxJpic.twitter.com/kscPeMmlX5
The letter in the tweet, to Labour leader Keir Starmer, states: “Given you have barred me from running as North East Mayor, despite being incumbent Mayor, I have no other choice. In 2020 you told me to my face that you would ‘inspire people to come together… disciplining people to be united is going nowhere.’ You’ve broken that promise.”
That’s one more broken promise to add to a very long list, then! And Mr Driscoll comments on this: “You’ve U-turned on so many promises: £28 billion to tackle the climate emergency, free school meals, ending university tuition fees, reversing NHS privatisation; in fact, a list of broken promises too long to repeat in this letter. And please stop saying ‘I make no apologies for…’ before you find yourself saying ‘I make no apologies for making no apologies.
“Britain is a mess. Wages have fallen behind inflation. People are struggling to pay mortgages. Knife crime is out of control. Business investment has flat lined. The climate response is barely existent. People with chest pains wait an hour for ambulances. Our transport system is in chaos.
“It is not grown-up politics to say Britain is broken, and then claim things are now so difficult
we will abandon any plan to fix it. That is mental gymnastics worthy of Olympic gold.”
Mr Driscoll continues: “Worst of all, you’ve said you’re not interested in hope and change. Well, I am – Britain needs hope and change. Instead of London Labour HQ barring me from running, you could have used my work as a showcase of economic competence.
“My Combined Authority has built affordable homes in rural and urban areas. I’ve worked with businesses large and small to deliver a pipeline of over 5,000 new jobs, all backed by our Good Work Pledge. Implemented a Green New Deal and invested heavily in offshore renewable energy. Our Child Poverty Prevention Programme is hailed as an exemplar of best practice. And we’ve increased adult education enrolments from 22,000 a year to 33,000 a year for the same budget. All this wealth generation was done without charging people a penny in council tax.
“I’ve led negotiations and delivered an expanded £4.27 billion devolution deal across the North East to transform our region’s transport system.
“I’ve done this by being pragmatic and putting results ahead of party politics – to the effect that I’ve received praise for my ‘constructive, non-partisan approach’ from Labour, Conservative, Lib Dem, Green and Independent Ministers, Mayors, MPs and councillors.
“I think I’ve shown that hope and change is not only possible – but that it’s a pragmatic, common sense response to the challenges of our time. This is not a time for faint hearts. It’s a time for bravery. Shy bairns get nowt.
“I didn’t become a politician until I was 48. I’m an engineer. Fixing broken systems is what I do.
“We need a new settlement. I value patriotism – and believe it’s expressed by public service, not xenophobia. My Dad drove a tank in the army, my brother served in the navy at the time of the Falklands. My politics are simple – I believe Britain should be run in the interests of the people who do the work. That includes those unable to work, and those retired from a lifetime of work. It’s not left-wing. It’s not right-wing. It’s common sense.
“The groundswell of support I’ve received has been humbling. Business leaders, trade union leaders, charity workers, huge numbers of Labour members, and elected politicians from every party have encouraged me to run as an independent, saying they will vote for me because the North East needs an autonomous voice that’s not in hock to Westminster Party HQs. They may be right.”
It all seems sensible to This Writer.
As an Independent, Mr Driscoll has no access to a political party’s electoral machine. He needs funds and he needs people who are willing to go out and campaign for him.
He has a GoFundMe site here. Its introductory information states: “A full campaign will cost around £150,000. I believe in listening to the public – so if you donate £25,000 by the end of August, I promise I’ll run. And I don’t hit that target, I won’t run. This decision is in your hands.
“As North East Mayor I’ll deliver a Total Transport Network, create a job for everyone who wants one, and deliver a Green New Deal. Find out more on my website https://jamiedriscoll.co.uk/”
Funders hit that £25k target in less than two hours. At the time of writing, he is well on his way to the full £150,000 needed to run a full campaign. I would urge you to support him.
And I would remind you that Jamie Driscoll is not the only former Labour representative now standing for election as an independent.
Expect information about the others in the very near future.
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Baroness Chapman: she thinks democracy is the right to vote for the person Keir Starmer and his cronies say should represent us, rather than the right to make our own choice. You see the difference?
“Everybody’s entitled to an opinion. What they’re not entitled to do is invent facts,” says Piers Morgan on a BBC News advert that’s currently airing.
Inventing facts was exactly what Baroness Jenny Chapman did – on the BBC – yesterday (June 11) when she told a BBC North interviewer that Labour Party members would be able to choose the candidate they want to be the new North East Mayor.
This is clearly untrue while Jamie Driscoll is excluded from the longlist of candidates.
Baroness Chapman batted this criticism away with a non sequitur claim that Labour is “not a debating society”. That much is very clear.
But it does present itself as a democratic organisation, and if candidates for political office are excluded from the running before people who are entitled to vote even have a chance to do so, then that claim is clearly untrue.
Here’s the dialogue – watch and listen for yourself:
“This is about getting the right outcome for the people of the North East?” Shouldn’t that be the right-wing outcome?
“We need to have a leader in the region who can be that champion for us.” Who’s “us” in that sentence?
Jamie Driscoll has repeatedly set out the list of his achievements as North of Tyne Mayor – and it’s a long list.
Isn’t Baroness Chapman’s concern that Labour’s representative should be someone who will do what her party’s leaders in Westminster want – and not what the people of the northeast need?
Voters in that region would be well-advised to boycott the Labour Party – no matter whose face is being used to represent it – until this insult to democracy is reversed, and apologies presented by all those involved in it. And that includes Baroness Chapman.
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It’s the thinnest excuse possible and everybody knows it: Keir Starmer wants self-confessed “last Corbynite in power”, Jamie Driscoll, out of his job as a metropolitan mayor, and he’s using a joint appearance with film director Ken Loach as the reason.
Mr Loach has already been expelled from the Labour Party, although nobody seems to know the reason, and Starmer’s mob is saying that Mr Driscoll having appeared at an event that the great British director also attended is enough reason to exclude him from candidate shortlists.
Mr Driscoll – rightly – reckons that’s a crock. He doesn’t even mention it in his article commenting on his achievements and the way his party is letting the people of northeast England down:
My first duty is to the people who elected me as their mayor. The Labour Party members here, in our region, chose me to represent them last time. They should have that choice again. It’s called #democracy. Read my article 👉 https://t.co/usXFikLEsRpic.twitter.com/aA0toPgouH
Labour struggles to convince the electorate it can handle the economy. You’d think I was exactly the success story the Labour Party would want to shout about. So when they barred me from standing as North East Mayor, it shocked people from across the political spectrum. I’ve had literally thousands of messages of support.
I identify as a socialist. Sometimes that puts me on a collision course with the Party leadership in London.
My first duty is to the people who elected me as their mayor. The Labour members here, in our region, chose me to represent them last time. They should have that choice again. It’s called democracy. Union leaders, MPs, and other Mayors are making my case, and asking for the decision to be reversed.
There’s a lack of trust in politics. Second homes. Second jobs. Cash for questions. Not me. £0 expenses claims. I pay for my own phone. I gave up my car and use my bike or public transport so I see what everyone else has to deal with.
Politics needs to change. We need a new direction. Power must reside in the North East, and in every region of Britain. Not in Westminster and Party HQs. I have a vision of a Britain that’s run in the interests of the people who do the work. And I believe we can get there.
Well said @MayorJD! "It is no secret that I support the policies that Keir Starmer got elected on, but obviously as he has changed his position I haven’t changed mine. My loyalty is to people in the North East,” Mr Driscoll said.https://t.co/n7rE0j2LW7
— Oliver 🌹✊💚 #ClimateAction #Socialist (@tynewrc) June 6, 2023
Say what you like about Unite General Secretary Sharon Graham; she’s on the right side of this argument:
What is emerging from @UKLabour is a pattern of behaviour to literally take out any MP or mayor who backs key manifesto demands on the re-nationalisation of #energy, action on rampant #profiteering and investment in UK steel. 🧵1/3 @bbclaurakhttps://t.co/QSIdvmqYTm
“Nodding heads” are exactly the kind of people Keir Starmer wants in all positions representing the Labour Party. It seems clear that the only people he wants to have any power at all are those who are completely subservient to him.
What of Ken Loach?
Well, we’ve established that he was expelled from the Labour Party for reasons that have never been disclosed. Anti-Semitism has been alleged but no accusation has ever stuck.
Still, right-wing lickspittles like Luke Akehurst are using association with Mr Loach as their reason for wanting rid of Mr Driscoll, as you can see below.
By that token, though, Keir Starmer should also be out of a job at the next election:
Er, Luke? You sure about that? Because this looks remarkably like Keir Starmer sharing a platform with Ken Loach…? And if memory serves, agreeing with what he said. Luke…? https://t.co/bJeXXQxNRIpic.twitter.com/JP1lrLiV3W
But when Mr Driscoll appeared on the BBC’s Newsnight, Labour sent a party drone from Sussex to undermine him with insults about David Brent (the Office idiot) and falsehoods about party rules.
And what happened? Mr Driscoll ran rings around Paul Richards, who made a fool of himself:
One of the big (cl)aims of @Keir_Starmer was to win over tradition northern Labour voters yet
here he sends out a lapdog from Sussex to tell voters in the NE they are wrong and they can’t have their current Mayor any more as London Labour says so. https://t.co/JAzm4OAV3e
The clip has been sent around Twitter by a few commenters, and their observations speak for themselves. Here‘s Alistair Greaves: “Honestly, @MayorJD gives these ghouls far much more politeness than they deserve. Not sure why the #biasedbbc let Paul Richards have the last word though, and while they can argue “no-one is bigger or better than the party or the rules” JAMIE DRISCOLL HASN’T BROKEN ANY RULES.”
How about MsAlfieB here? “Was the BoD demand that Labour suspend anyone sharing a platform with an expelled member written into the rules? If so that’s really shocking Surely a mayor works for all in his city, not for the Labour party. Labour Party rules can’t be imposed on public servants doing their job.”
(The “BoD” would be the Board of Deputies of British Jews, which is not a Labour-affiliated organisation. But Starmer seems to have allied with it in his purge of left-wing party members.)
Also during that Newsnight appearance, Richards tried to justify the blocking of Mr Driscoll as a candidate by claiming he does not meet the criteria (again: because Mr Driscoll had appeared at an event where Ken Loach – who has not done anything quantifiably wrong – also appeared).
Here’s what happened when interviewer Victoria Derbyshire countered with a list of Mr Discoll’s actual achievements as North Tyne Mayor:
Former 'Labour special adviser' Paul Richards justifys blocking Jamie Driscoll as a candidate. The presenter then reads out some of the ways Jamie has improved peoples lives in the NE as Mayor, and all Richards can say is: "Well great, and congratulations to him" pic.twitter.com/Z89fkBmXa3
Paul Richards appears to hold a grudge against Ken Loach.
Sent out to do @UKLabour’s dirty work on #Newsnight. Looks a total idiot.@MayorJD broke no rules & is an excellent Mayor; it’s all about driving out the left.
Keir Starmer said in January he wanted to “take back control” for local communities. The Labour leader wants them to have more say over jobs, transport, energy, climate change, housing, culture, childcare and finance. He wants to liberate what is now recognised as the most centralised state in Europe. So why, now, has the Labour leader decided that the people of the North of Tyne area will not be permitted to reselect their current mayor, Jamie Driscoll, to stand for Labour at the next election? Why did he agree in March that his predecessor as leader, Jeremy Corbyn, should not be reselected as MP for Islington North?
Whatever the perceived misdeeds of these two politicians, surely these are matters for their respective communities to decide on. Come to that, I notice in the past few weeks that, despite his devolution speech, Starmer wants no devolution of power over council tax rises, local housing decisions or the siting of wind turbines, among other things. Nor will he tolerate any nonsense from Scottish people about “taking back control” of Scotland.
Even before he finds himself in Downing Street, Starmer cannot bring himself to respect the local diversity that has long been Labour’s strength. He cannot allow his party to let the people of the north-east choose who it is they want to lead them. It is a very bad start.
The condemnation seems universal; everyone who doesn’t have an interest in opposing Mr Driscoll seems to be supporting him.
That means two things:
Firstly, the old lies about anti-Semitism aren’t going to work any more.
Secondly, it doesn’t matter who else is on Labour’s shortlist for the new North East Mayor job; if Jamie Driscoll isn’t on it, Labour won’t have a hope of winning the election.
Will Keir Starmer learn his lesson from this?
Probably not, sadly.
In fact, he’ll probably take revenge by setting his sights on two other metropolitan mayors who have supported Mr Driscoll – Steve Rotherham and Andy Burnham.
And that would be an even worse mistake.
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Yes, the factionalism within the Labour Party really has become so ridiculous that a successful party representative can be removed from office undemocratically, simply because he met somebody who is not liked by those who are currently in control.
Here’s North of Tyne Mayor Jamie Driscoll:
I’ve been barred from standing as North East Mayor by @UKLabour. No explanation has been given. I’m proud to have created thousands of jobs, fought child poverty, built affordable homes and delivered our Green New Deal. I believe in democracy. Share if you do too. More to follow.
The announcement has been greeted with shock by many, including senior members of the Labour Party:
This is staggering news. To refuse to allow a serving mayor onto even a selection long list demonstrates that factionalism in the party is completely out of control. Jamie Driscoll @MayorJD is widely credited with doing a great job. There can be no other motive for excluding him. https://t.co/uKLZwGJdPF
— John McDonnell MP (@johnmcdonnellMP) June 2, 2023
And what’s the reason for this sudden deselection?
Apparently it’s because Mr Driscoll once met and shared a platform with the filmmaker Ken Loach, who has been ejected from the party on unsupported grounds of anti-Semitism.
Labour said the pair sharing a platform had been “incompatible” with its attempts to tackle antisemitism,
Loach was expelled from Labour in 2021 amid efforts to tackle the antisemitism experienced during Jeremy Corbyn’s leadership
and anybody who knows anything at all about anti-Semitism in the Labour Party will know perfectly well that it fell during Mr Corbyn’s time as leader.
From this, it is easy to demonstrate (i) that the BBC doesn’t bother to check its facts these days, and (ii) that factionalism in the Labour Party is indeed, as John McDonnell stated, out of control.
Apparently,
a senior Labour source told the Press Association Mr Driscoll’s candidacy was blocked because he had appeared with Loach at Newcastle’s Live Theatre.
The source said the mayor’s appearance with the director – famed for films including I, Daniel Blake – and his subsequent “refusing to apologise” was “clearly incompatible” with the party’s promise “to have zero tolerance of antisemitism”.
But
the party has never confirmed why [Mr Loach] was kicked out.
This is bad news for left-wing lovers of quality movies, as Ian Hodson (among many others) has pointed out.
Did you watch or own a copy of Kes or I Daniel Blake chances are under a government run by the #Starmer party you will be charged smeared and convicted under new law of #AssociationCrime
By the way, if Starmer did bring in a law of ‘association crime’, the UK would have to have split from the European Convention on Human Rights and its own Human Rights laws. That would, of course, be entirely out of character for any Labour leadership.
Here’s a member of that party’s current leadership, Jonathan Reynolds, showing that he and his colleagues are indeed out of step with the facts and the character of the party.
"Where somebody shares a platform with someone who themselves has been expelled from the Lab Party for their views on antisemitism.. that would preclude them from being a candidate"
Remember, according to the BBC, Labour has never confirmed its reason for expelling Mr Loach.
Another person who thinks it’s okay to override democracy – remember, Jamie Driscoll is the democratically-elected sitting mayor of an English region; by deselecting him, Labour is usurping the right of the voters to re-elect the representative they want – is right-wing lunatic Luke Akehurst, who many believe to be using anti-Semitism as an excuse to rid the party of people he doesn’t like.
Here are a few opinions on that:
I don’t think people, particularly in the media, realise how big a deal this is and how quickly it’s happened.
It’s now okay to remove an elected leader (or block them from re-standing) because they spoke to someone. University politics.
This can't be treated seriously. This twerpish pronouncement by a self important toxic nincompoop, belittling one of our best and most worthy film-makers, doesn't merit a serious response. It's embarrassingly ludicrous. It deserves nothing but a blown raspberry. pic.twitter.com/QhmiZ4GIsK
— MsAlfieB 🇵🇸#SolidarityWithDiane #ItWasAScam (@duduschka) June 3, 2023
Luke Akehurst, Labour’s foremost apartheid apologist, the little weasel behind these purges, has weaponised antisemitism simply to settle scores against the left.
Before anyone leaps in to defend Loony Luke, let’s have a balancing view of who the current Labour leadership (including, one concludes, him) thinks is an acceptable person to meet.
I'm hearing sharing a platform with anti-racist socialist filmaker Ken Loach is grounds for deselection by diktat?
Yet hobnobbing with racist Nakba denialist Tzipi Hotovely and chairman of the Israeli State Control Committee Mickey Levy, as Sir Keir did last September, is fine? pic.twitter.com/uJPJWxb81S
No wonder Labour’s party membership is plummeting, with plenty of people out here happy to help anybody who wants to abandon the sinking ship (like lifeboat users, not like rats):
Poor Labour can't work out how many members they have.
If you've cancelled your direct debit, but forgot to let them know you've quit, you can do so at the link below.
If you haven't cancelled your direct debit, completing this has the same effect! https://t.co/MG0BOFrKQT
Apparently (and I must be careful here; I’m quoting another BBC report), Mr Driscoll’s deselection leaves Starmerite Kim McGuinness in pole position to become Labour’s candidate.
I think we can all understand why that might seem suspicious.
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Jeremy Corbyn: no, he wasn’t signing the petition for his own reinstatement in the Parliamentary Labour Party – in fact he was writing about Jews including Roza Robota, Szmul Zygielbojm and Anne Frank, in the Holocaust Educational Trust’s book of remembrance. Anti-Semite? Don’t make us laugh, Starmer.
Remember This Site’s article yesterday (May 20, 2023), ridiculing Jewish Labour Movement chair Mike Katz for praising Keir Starmer’s handling of “cranks”, “racists” and “extremists”?
I quoted his comments about Jeremy Corbyn as an example of this, in which he claimed of the most committed anti-racist in Parliament: “His reluctance to show any remorse and his continual denial and downplaying of the problem makes him the author of his own demise and negates any claim he can make to actually being anti-racist.”
And yet on the same day Vox Political published its article, more than 70,000 people were revealed to have signed a petition demanding that Starmer’s Labour restore the party whip to Mr Corbyn.
It also demands that the Labour Party in the Islington North constituency be allowed to select their own candidate for the next general election, after the party’s National Executive Committee supported a Starmer motion barring Mr Corbyn from standing.
According to the Morning Star,
The Islington North MP and former Labour leader had the party whip withdrawn after saying anti-semitism within Labour had been “overstated for political reasons” and was blocked from representing Labour in the next general election earlier this year by an unrelated motion to the NEC claiming he would undermine Labour’s chances of forming a government because he led it to defeat in 2019.
LAAA national organiser Matt Willgress criticised Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer for breaching a campaign promise that local party members should select their candidates for every election.
Young Labour activist and Arise volunteer Fraser McGuire said it is clear that many Labour members and supporters want to protect party democracy and allow Islington North CLP members to select their own candidate.
He said this would “undoubtedly” be Mr Corbyn.
Campaign for Labour Party Democracy co-chairwoman Rachel Garnham said it was unsurprising that tens of thousands feel “aggrieved by Starmer’s hypocrisy and top-down approach to candidate selection.”
An Islington Friends of Corbyn spokesperson said people are “angrier than ever about the continuing injustice” against Mr Corbyn and the constituency.
This Writer feels sure that these people won’t be voting Labour in a future election, if they don’t get their way.
What will Keir Starmer do in response – brand them all as anti-Semites?
Of course, the petition makes a nonsense of Katz’s claim that Starmer had properly handled “cranks”, “racists” and “extremists” in the Labour.
Instead, it strongly suggests that Starmer has vindictively attacked honest, hard-working Labour Party members whose only crime was standing up for the positive values the party was formed to represent – rather than the perverted, narcissistic, power-for-its-own-sake policies of the current leader.
And we haven’t even touched on StarmerLabour’s anti-black racism yet. Look for that in a future article.
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“The selections for Labour Party candidates needs [sic] to be more democratic and we should end NEC impositions of candidates. Local Party members should select their candidates for every election.”
Well, Islington North Constituency Labour Party has done just that – passing a motion of support for MP Jeremy Corbyn and expressing the desire that he should be their candidate in the next general election.
There’s a problem with that: Keir Starmer’s NEC has ruled that Mr Corbyn may no longer stand for election as a Labour Party candidate. He demanded this NEC imposition in spite of his own words from 2020 that you see at the top of this article.
Responses from those of us who keep an eye on the retreat of democracy in the Labour Party have drawn the logical conclusions:
Indeed. Starmer won’t respect the wishes of Labour Party members and is likely to impose his own preferred candidate (some are already suggesting that Sam Tarry has been chosen). Also…
Suspension (for some spurious reason) of the members that voted in… 3 … 2 … 1
… it does seem likely that Starmer will take revenge on the constituency delegates who voted against his orders.
No doubt we shall see what he does soon enough.
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Jacob Rees-Mogg: he’s probably cursing after seeing these poll results. But what kind of imprecation would this educated toff utter?
It’s turning into a bad week for Jacob Rees-Mogg (and a good week for the rest of us).
Not only has his Retained EU Law Bill been paused on its way through Parliament – possibly never to return (it is rubbish, after all), but…
Opinion polls are showing that he is likely to lose his North East Somerset Parliamentary seat in the next general election.
A swing of almost 30 points in the court of public opinion has been recorded in his constituency.
It’s understood that a Labour candidate would record more than 38% of the vote if the polls were open this weekend, whereas the senior Tory is only projected to fetch 34%.
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