Labour party

Since Nigel Farage’s latest resignation as Ukip leader, it has become clear that he is the only person who can hold the party together. Without him, Ukip has become a seemingly endless brawl between various hostile factions. Still, this leaderless mess has more supporters than the Liberal Democrats. That’s because Ukip, for all its flaws, has given a voice to those ignored in an overly centrist political debate — first Eurosceptic Tories, then working-class Labour voters. With decent leadership, Ukip could still do to the Labour party in the north of England what the SNP has done to it in Scotland. Steven Woolfe might have been able to supply that leadership, had he not been hospitalised by a fellow MEP. He has now quit, saying that Ukip is over.

Vote Leave was the most successful electoral campaign in British history. Against the opposition of all three political parties, it won, achieving the largest vote for anything in this country, ever. But voting to leave is only the essential start, not the fulfilment, and now there is no Vote Leave. After victory, the campaign’s leaders went their various ways. Some were lulled into a false sense of security by Mrs May’s clear declaration of Brexit intent, and by the fact that one of their top colleagues, Stephen Parkinson, is now installed in 10 Downing Street. Nick Timothy, now all-powerful in Mrs May’s counsels, was running the New Schools Network during the campaign.

There are some crushes that ought to be crushed. When I was about nine, I fancied our village vicar — he had a pleasant, boring face and would throw Mars bars into the congregation during sermons. Things came to a halt after I saw him by chance at a local swimming pool. Underneath his cassock was a lawn of hair so dark, you couldn’t see his skin. Even his arms were furred. I was, in the way of many nine-year-olds, ruthless in my judgement. I stopped fancying him at once and avoided him at church, calling him 'Gorilla Priest' in my head. Years on, I find myself contending with another embarrassing crush. I have a bit of a thing for Jeremy Corbyn — or 'Jessica Chastain' as I like to call him in company.

I never really agreed with the central-thesis of The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy — that ‘42’ is the answer to life, the universe and everything. I have no great animus against the number — it does its job, filling that yawning gap between 41 and 43. But I had never thought it actually-special until the beginning of this week. That’s when I read that the Conservative Party was 17 points ahead in the latest opinion polls, on 42 per cent. A remarkable figure. I suppose you can argue that it says more about the current state of the Labour party than it does about Theresa May’s stewardship of the country.

Emily Thornberry put in a memorable performance on Question Time last night. Unfortunately for the shadow foreign secretary, it was an appearance that will be remembered for all the wrong reasons. Thornberry was heckled after sucking up to Corbyn, and she managed to make the audience groan when she claimed what united Labour was ‘so much more than what divides us’ (Mr S suspects there are many Labour MPs who might disagree with that view). Thornberry also tried to claim Labour were more grown-up than the Tories, saying her party fought ‘in the press’ rather than ‘in closed rooms’. But she saved her biggest clanger for when she was talking about Brexit.

I never really agreed with the central-thesis of The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy — that ‘42’ is the answer to life, the universe and everything. I have no great animus against the number — it does its job, filling that yawning gap between 41 and 43. But I had never thought it actually-special until the beginning of this week. That’s when I read that the Conservative Party was 17 points ahead in the latest opinion polls, on 42 per cent. A remarkable figure. I suppose you can argue that it says more about the current state of the Labour party than it does about Theresa May’s stewardship of the country.

Well that didn't last long. Just minutes after Jeremy Corbyn completed a fairly successful turn at PMQs, his spokesman plunged Labour into another row over Russia's behaviour in Syria. Following the Foreign Secretary's call for the public to protest outside the Russian embassy, Corbyn's spokesman thinks they might as well head to the American embassy while they're at it: https://twitter.com/GuardianHeather/status/786178839219150848 https://twitter.com/steve_hawkes/status/786178675599372288 https://twitter.com/KateEMcCann/status/786182653573595136 Then again this briefing ought not to come as a huge surprise. Corbyn, and one of his staff members who shall remain unnamed, are supporters of Stop the War.

Although Jeremy Corbyn's spokesman described tonight's meeting of the PLP as barely registering on the Richter scale in terms of hostility, it could hardly be described as an hour of sweetness and light. While the meeting appeared to get off to a good start with loud cheers that could be heard from the corridor, it later transpired that the applause was for Rosie Winterton -- the chief whip Corbyn sacked -- rather than the Labour leader himself. When Corbyn praised Winterton for her work in the role over the past six years, he was heckled by MPs who questioned why he had fired Winterton if he really thought so much of her. Corbyn didn't have much more luck taking questions from his MPs.

Jeremy Corbyn is taking Labour ever further away from its traditional working class voters in the north and the midlands. As I say in The Sun today, the party now has a leader who didn’t sing the national anthem at St Paul’s, a shadow Chancellor who has praised the IRA, a shadow Home Secretary who thinks promising ‘controls on immigration’ is shameful and a shadow Foreign Secretary who sneers at those who fly the English flag. This presents Ukip with an open goal and a chance to do to Labour in the north and the midlands what the SNP did to in Scotland following the independence referendum. Indeed, half of Labour supporters who backed Brexit already say they won’t vote for the party again.