Things not to do when you’re sixteen points behind

Number One – be divisive and pursue old vendettas.

There cannot be many things within the Labour party that would unite Luke Akehurst and Peter Kenyon. Charles Clarke has managed to find one. Strangely enough, ordinary Labour party members don’t think that now is the opportune moment, shortly before local and London elections, to start talking about a coup within the party. Charles Clarke seems to be doing the rounds, days before an election, and talking about getting rid of Brown.

I do not think, even if the upcoming elections went badly, that we should change our leader. Even if, however, I thought that was the case, now would be just about the worst possible time to broach the subject. It can wait a few days.

Luke makes a good point at the post I like to above: “prolonged speculation would be the worst possible scenario”. Indeed, as we saw over the election that wasn’t, prevarication is just damaging. I hope that Charles Clarke – if the story reported in the Independent is correct – is taken to one side and told in no uncertain terms that his day has passed. I wrote some time ago about Clarke’s antics – September of 2006 – and a bizarre hatred he seems to have for Mr Brown. It does no-one, least of all the party, any favours.

There is something going on around a suggestion from Calder Valley CLP that, when there is a vacancy for leader, the minimum number of nominating MPs should be reduced from 12.5% to 7%. I probably support the measure as it should be pretty bloody difficult to fire a leader and should certainly be out of the reach of a small group of malcontents (and just for once I don’t mean the Campaign Group) but choice shouldn’t be unnecessarily restricted when there is a vacancy. It seems that some of the promoters are from the John McDonnell campaign, although that doesn’t make much difference either way.

xD.

PS Thanks to Alice for spotting the silly error deliberate mistake in the title