It's not what the establishment wanted, not the Labour Party establishment, not, I'll bet, London establishment, and if the Panorama Programme last Monday is any indication, not what the BBC wanted.
But it is very very clearly what the membership wanted. He had around 60% of the vote on first preferences. That's more than Tony Blair had when he was elected.
So now it's up to the parliamentary parties, in London, Edinburgh, Brussels and Cardiff to get over their disappointments, remember that they are there to serve the membership, and get behind Jeremy Corbyn and Tom Watson. The scale of Corbyn's win leaves them very little choice.
Will they, though?
 |
| Jamie Reed's resignation... Put on Twitter before Mr Corbyn had the chance to read it? If indeed so, classy! |
During the contest there were many threats and "promises" made.
People said that they doubted that they would be prepared to serve under a Corbyn leadership. Scotland's one and only Labour MP, a supporter of Cooper, only announced a few days ago that, on reflection, he would be prepared to serve under Corbyn having previously doubted it. Of course, by this week it was plain that the likely outcome was a Corbyn win.
On the other hand, Jamie Reed must be the first to have resigned. I'd never heard of him, but I'm sure he was very important in his own way. His resignation letter was published on Twitter as Mr Corbyn stood on stage making his acceptance speech.
How many will follow?
 |
| Needless to say this has been notices elsewhere... |
Now he is her boss.
It will be interesting to see if she is going to get behind him or if she will carp from the sidelines.
 |
| Oh don't worry Tony, not much likelihood that anyone will need you anymore. |
Tris
ReplyDeleteDugdale is an opportunist of the worst kind, we have seen that with her all along, esp on how quickly she distanced herself from Murphy after the disaster at the GE. I expect her to say all the right things that won't upset her new leader. She will also keep her head down overall, what might be interesting will be if the Alan Grogan's of the world drift back and the members decide the Blairites are gone, possibly Dugdale's time is up before it has even started.
Will it have an impact on the SNP in Scotland! Not right away but you never know long term but any Labour recovery in Scotland is going to be very slow and painful, Jeremy Corbyn or not. Nationally will Corbyn form an alliance with the SNP to fight against this Tory Government that do have a shoggly majority. Will Tim Farron step up to the plate as a social Liberal, probably not but right now the Liberal Democrats are sadly irrelevant. I think politics in the UK actually got a lot more interesting today and if Labour are smart they will give Corbyn time as I suspect many in this country are desperate for change and there might be enough to put the Tories under real pressure, esp on things like trident and austerity. If I was Corbyn I would get Cooper and Burnham etc right out of the picture now as they cannot be trusted as we have seen, esp with Burnham who will say anything to anybody to get an inch forward himself, I actually despise him more than Kendall.
For my own party the Liberals it will be interesting to see the direction it wants to go down, if it tries to seize the center ground it will fail badly. It really needs to fight for a social Liberal message and that is certainly what I will be arguing for at every opportunity.
Interesting times.
Bruce
She's been pathetic over this. She seems to stand for nothing except what her boss tells her to stand for. She was all over Jim Murphy's right wing nonsense and now she's Corbyn's man.
DeleteNo principles; just a job.
Whilst I think that Reed is a crass tasteless oaf for releasing his resignation to the public on Twitter before Mr Corbyn had seen it. He has stated his right wing credentials and resigned from the job.
I see several others have too.
Some are saying that they will resign unless he goes back on his policies.
That's fair enough.
It's the ones who stay and try to overthrow him that will be the real trouble.
They are so desperate to keep Labour as a party of the centre right with all their rich friends and big business contacts for the future. Mr Hunt and Mr Umunna seem to be at the back of this.
They threaten to vote against Labour and with the Tories...
The SNP in Scotland are in accord with much of British Labour policy so that doesn't leave the Dug with much to disagree over at Holyrood.
ReplyDeleteUnless,of course,she disagrees with those policies in which case.......
Much of Corbyn policy yes. It's gonna be hard to bleat 'SNP bad' when Mr Corbyn is saying the same stuff.
DeleteStill I'm sure the BBC will balance it all out.
I wonder if they can just ignore him just like they do the SNP? He had to complain already about the Panorama programme so it bodes well for him. As a he is a Unionist I think Scots should ignore him other wise they are in for heartache.
DeleteWe can work with him again the austerity policies of the UK. But I'm not sure that all his party will vote with him on that. Some of them seem just as committed to penalising the poor and vulnerable as the Eton lot are.
DeleteI'll stick with my previous prediction, "Scottish" Labour will shite its self and the PLP will fight each other like knife wielding ferrets in a burlap sack.
ReplyDeleteProbably. :)
DeleteUnfortunately for the poor.
Labour like blood sports and that is what is going to happen. They will tear themselves asunder and thought it will not be pretty to watch, it will be fulfilling karma for us.
DeleteRevenge is a dish best tasted cold.
In the end, even though it takes time, let's hope Labour will win for having elected a Labour leader instead of yet another Tory. Let's also hope that they will be doing it in a foreign country!
DeleteWell Rachel Reeves
ReplyDelete"We are not the party of people on benefits. We don’t want to be seen, and we're not, the party to represent those who are out of work"
won't serve in the shadow cabinet on her return from maternity leave. And Tristam Hunt has also announced he won't serve in Corbyn's cabinet.
He is about to be monstered by the media on a scale he's not yet seen. He'd better have a thick skin or a quick word on how to cope with Alex Salmond who might have had some adverse press in his time!
Rachel Reeves is about as much of a loss as Richard Baker.
DeleteShe is more right wing on the poor than IDS and Mone.
I think Corbyn has a very thick skin.
I wish him luck.
How long will the retires list become?
ReplyDeleteLiz Kendall
Yvette Cooper
Rachel Reeves
Chuka Umunna
Tristam Hunt
Emma Reynolds
Jamie Reed
Every one, a dyed in the wool red Tory.
Deletehttp://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/politics/Jeremy_Corbyn/11859694/Labours-shadow-health-minister-resigns-moments-after-Jeremy-Corbyn-victory.html
DeleteHate to link to the Torygraph, but they are enjoying this, and their newfound tabloidness is a joy to behold.
Like John Prescott, I had never heard of Reed. Bit sad for his constituents that his only notable contribution to UK politics is his resignation and the only feature anybody recognises about their elected representative is their arse going oot the door.
ReplyDeleteVERY true.
DeleteAnd amusingly put!
Positive note: people in England will, hopefully, now have a party worth voting for.
ReplyDeleteLet us bear in mind, however, that Corbyn is a British Unionist.
Yes.
DeleteIn political terms he may not be a blessing to Scotland.
He is against the EU and for the UK.
Heaven knows why.
But at least, as you say, the people of England won't be forced to chose between the Tory Party and the Other Tory Party.
Erm, who is Jamie Reed? I'd never heard of him. But in my view, Reed has no place in the Labour Party, or any party for that matter. Corbyn was elected under a democratic vote, so Reed could have at least had the courtesy to wait for Corbyn to set up his shadow cabinet. If you are an MP or MSP, you must show loyalty to the leader, unless there is a specific policy you disagree with.
ReplyDeleteI think Corbyn might cause a few worries for the SNP. Some of his policies are in cloud cuckoo land (well, to be fair, every party has some strange policies). However, he is quite articulate and does not conform to the manufactured politician we have had to suffer for a few years.
zog
Hello Zog... (any relation to the Albanian king?)
DeleteAbout Reed (no, no one seems to have heard of him) saying he'll stand down (and the others who did the same).
It occurs to me that at the end of a leadership, and the beginning of another one, that there are bound to be changes, regardless.
You'd expect all shadow cabinet people to stand down as a matter of course, and wait to be asked, or not, to join the new leaders' team.
How does Reed (on any of the others) know that he (they) would be wanted in the new team?
Added to that, the incredible bad manners of the man to release his letter to Twitter instead of letting Mr Corbyn see it first. He comes over as an ill-bred brat, as well a s a nonentity..
DeleteNot the Albanian king, although I was aware of it. I got the name from the 2000AD comic, the character being a sort of stone age psychotic dwarf who carried a big club. Funnily enough, IDS seems to have copied his tactics - stone age thinking and battering anyone and everyone he doesn't like.
DeleteCorbyn reminds me of Farage and Boris Likeable characters but don't let them have any real power. The good thing is all these Blairite types buggering off to the back benches. As with too many politicians these days, they all look the same. Corbyn will certainly get Labour back up, but only enough to produce a hung parliament, and that will be to the SNP's advantage.
tris and the other Labour Haters
ReplyDeleteJeremy is about achieving a policy objective and not party hegemony
if at the end a fairer society is brought about by a coalition of like minded
people.............wots the problem ???
Obviously it suits the snp extremists to want all the scots living in shite
as long as they can claim its all westminsters fault...........so any London
MP is a hated snp enemy ..natch !
Anyway tris just got back from a week in Athens so seen loads of migrants/refugees
both in Athens and at the port of pireaus ..
No man is an island,
Entire of itself,
Every man is a piece of the continent,
A part of the main.
If a clod be washed away by the sea,
Europe is the less.
As well as if a promontory were.
As well as if a manor of thy friend's
Or of thine own were:
Any man's death diminishes me,
Because I am involved in mankind,
And therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls;
It tolls for thee.
John Donne
Will do a post on my experience can only say it was eye opening
heart rending sight
First of all Niko. Welcome back. You've been missed.
DeleteHope you had a good holiday.
Secondly Congratulations. I know you wanted a Corbyn win, as I, and most Munguin readers did.
I'm really happy and I was chuffed by his speech, and by his attitude in general. I note that he has asked for an appointment with Bercow to discuss the manner of the conduct of PMQs, for which he has no time.
I can't wait to see the effect his polite good manners will have on Cameron and his snide slime-ball behaviour at PMQs.
I have no idea where all your vitriol about SNP came from. Not necessary. Nicola Sturgeon was one of the first to send her congratulations. I think most SNP people are delighted.
I'd hope that the SNP and Labour would work together to defeat the sheer horror of people setting themselves alight in job centres, having to steal Mars bars to stay alive, because they have been sanctioned by morons in the jobcentre because they can't understand how to fill in forms.
I hope we will work with Mr Corbyn to stop the renewal of trident and the waste of hundreds of billions for a weapon that is out of date and no earthly use, and which if we used it, would probably signal the end of the world as we know it.
I hope we will work together to make Cameron and his Eton/Oxford cabinet behave like human beings over the refugees.
Mr Corbyn is against independence for Scotland. He is a unionist. So I disagree with him on that, but people who know him suggest that he is a democrat. If Scottish people want to be independent he will not fight them. And you'll never hear an insult from Jeremy. He'll never behave like Darling, Brown and McDougal.
We've a lot more in common than we have that separates us.
Let's all cheer about the change that has happened today. As far as the SNP is concerted we now have an ally in Westminster, where we had an enemy. We'll worry about independence once we've punctured Cameron and his visceral hatred of the working classes.
I look forward to your post on the refugees. It must have been awful to see. it's bad enough on Yourtube.
Tweet From Angus B MacNeil:
DeleteJeremy Corbyn has probably voted with SNP more than any other Lab MP apart from maybe Dennis Skinner #labourleadership #Congratulations
Maybe you should get off your hate fence Niko as nobody likes haters for haters sake.
DeleteA href="https://opendemocracy.net/ourkingdom/anthony-barnett/corbyns-golden-opportunity-0">https://opendemocracy.net/ourkingdom/anthony-barnett/corbyns-golden-opportunity-0
https://opendemocracy.net/ourkingdom/anthony-barnett/corbyns-golden-opportunity-0
DeleteThanks CH
Delete