Labour party

Owen Smith is now in a head-to-head battle with Jeremy Corbyn for the Labour leadership. We'll know by September 24th - the day before the Labour party conference starts - who has come out on top. As things stand, Corbyn is the clear favourite: a recent YouGov poll put the party's current leader 20 points ahead of his rival. But Owen Smith is not going to relinquish without a fight and has already been doing his best to counter one of his main problems - how well-known he is. Smith has been positioning himself as the 'radical' yet 'normal' alternative to Corbyn in various interviews. He's also vowed to be like the 'duracell bunny' in his energy for taking the fight to Corbyn and ousting the Labour leader. Ninety Labour MPs are pinning their hopes on him doing just that.

Jesus H Christ. Is this what it comes down to? A smarmy post-Tribunite nonentity swathed in unrealistic ambition, versus Chauncey Gardener? It is close to pointless wondering who to support between these political titans, Owen Smith or Jeremy Corbyn. If Smith wins, which I doubt very, very, much, he is no more adept to change the nature of the party than is Corbyn. He has not the nous, balls or means to challenge the activist base and thus recapture those Labour votes which, since 2005, have been winnowing away to Ukip, or the Tories, or to nowhere. Nor even that much support within the PLP. There are two big issues upon which Labour has lost its votes: immigration and welfare.

The Trident debate might be about national security, but all the parties have political points they want to make. Indeed, the reason the debate is happening now is that the Tories wanted something to bring them together, and divide, Labour post-referendum. Angus Robertson, the SNP’s Westminster leader, began with a few kind words for the new Prime Minister. But then, he was straight on to repeatedly—and theatrically—asking the government front bench to set out what the full life time cost of the Trident replacement would be. https://www.youtube.com/watch?

I loathe labels but used to be described - indeed described myself - as a socialist. Perhaps as a result of having been conceived at a conference of sex-pest Gerry Healy's Socialist Labour League (SLL) in Morecambe, then christened (or rather, named - my family are atheist) Mark after Marx, I never had much doubt about which side I hung. My father's family were working class, Methodist, union-organising, tenant association-running, pro-Suffragette, anti-bomb. Many of my happiest childhood memories were being taken on marches against nukes, apartheid and vivisection. Even now my father struggles with the concept that not all Conservatives are fundamentally evil. My mother's family were more extreme: my nan was an Irish Republican, and even now my mum's father remains a Stalinist.

This week, Mr S made his way to Boisdale to watch his Spectator comrade Rod Liddle give the key address at the fifth annual Freedom Dinner. Hosted by Forest, Liddle stayed on-message at the libertarian bash -- speaking freely on a range of topics from his Labour suspension to the Guardian's Comment is Free section. Here is the speech in full: Many thanks for inviting me here tonight. I have been told that I was picked to deliver this address from among a very large list of people, solely because I have children and am a mother. This gives me great empathy and understanding and also the right to amend my CV whenever the feeling takes me. That was a star which rose and fell rather speedily, wasn’t it? Before we even learned how to pronounce her name.