Silver Surfer Packs a Punch

Joe Haines may be 89 years young, but Harold Wilson's former press secretary doesn't pull his punches about the mess the Labour Party finds itself in under new management with Jeremy Corbyn.

Essentially, Joe believes that Jezza is completely out of his depth and he is scathing about Corbyn's suitability for high office, never mind the role of Prime Minister, as is clear from the following extract which gets right to the point:

"Corbyn has no vision for the future of Britain. He offers no beacon to light the way. Politically, he has the candlepower of a glow-worm. He might once have fitted the role of a deputy manager of a northern friendly society, kind, polite and compassionate yet unable to help his client, but he is intellectually unsuited to be a minister of any kind, let alone a prime minister."

Now I agree with Joe's assessment because JC is really just a bog-standard union official whose only 'achievement' is that he has been a serial rebel on the Labour back benches for the past 34 years and as I said on the blog site a little while back, it's a bit like the school caretaker being appointed as its head teacher.

But Joe doesn't just put his finger on the problem, he's also got the balls to come up with a solution which would involve the Parliamentary Labour Party (PLP) putting their own mandate on the line in a direct challenge to their party leader.

Because as Joe Haines points out only 121,751 out of 245,520 party members voted for Jeremy Corbyn as leader whereas Labour MPs, collectively, attracted 9.35 million votes in the May 2015 general election. Even using the full Labour 'selectorate' Corbyn's support rises to 251,000 boosted by £3 registered supporters and trade union votes.

So who is in the best position to speak for Labour: Jeremy Corbyn or the 231 recently elected Labour MPs who appear to have no confidence in Jezza's ability to lead them into the 2020 general election?

Let's see what happens.      

http://www.newstatesman.com/politics/uk/2016/01/micawber-syndrome-or-why-labour-mps-must-depose-jeremy-corbyn-now

The Micawber Syndrome 


In this personal and provocative piece, Joe Haines, Harold Wilson's press secretary, argues that the Labour moderates cannot "wait for something to turn up" in their battle against Jeremy Corbyn's leadership. 

BY JOE HAINES

Labour will lose the next general election if Jeremy Corbyn is still its leader, and lose it by a substantial margin. A distrusted and unloved Conservative Party will win something resembling a landslide victory. No ifs or buts, as David Cameron might say: that is the plain, unpalatable truth. Either he goes or the party itself is a goner. Those who believe otherwise are the Flat Earthers of British politics.

Barring a cataclysmic economic failure or a sexual scandal of unimaginable proportions, Cameron’s successor will have a shoo-in and a near-moribund Liberal Democrat party will get a kiss of life and dream of beating Labour for second place. Scotland, if it is still in the Union by 2020, wouldn’t offer a hope of returning to the Labour fold; the Scots voters know a wee, sleekit, cow’rin’, tim’rous beastie when they see one and Corbyn would be lucky to keep our only seat. Either we wake up or we shut up. Too bleak? Too pessimistic? A fantasy scenario and not realistic? No.

Joe Haines served as press secretary to Harold Wilson from 1969-76. This article appears in the latest New Statesman magazine, The God Issue.