Simon Barnes

The next few years will feature so, so SO many columns and Substacks by people claiming that things were going well and Labour just needed to 'stick with Morgan's plan'.

Just really wanted his own Popemobile

This is how to answer that toxic question (With slightly different wording if you’re not actually the governor of Minnesota)

Another open goal to revive Starmer's fortunes that he's obviously going to look at for moment before calmly walking off

Hey, my friends saw you at the Woke Progressive and Sectarian Islamist Convention and they said you were telling everyone how to vote

Labour have alienated the voters they had on the left, and failed to win over any of the voters they have courted on the right. Now their core appeal is all but gone and ever growing numbers of voters have exit options on the left, right and in the centre.

Welcome to the Valley of Electoral Death.

I find it hard to believe Starmer would be talking about a Reform win in this way. He'd say they were divisive but he'd also say something about why people find that division appealing right now, and the need for Labour to appeal to those concerns.

Sectarian.

The sheer contempt and entitlement in that word.

Thousands of Muslim voters just voted for a white, (I think) working class non-Muslim woman because they feel abandoned by Labour and agree with her views on a huge foreign policy issue and on immigration policy

To somewhat paraphrase @stephenkb.bsky.social great newsletter, it’s quite the achievement for Reform to have constructed themselves in such a way as to maximise their own opposition, and at the same time, in bizarre inversion, for Labour to have deconstructed themselves to accomplish the same.

I’m so relieved that even in a “three way tie” voters still know how to beat them.

So just as a final word on this by election before polls close:

No matter what the result, Gorton and Denton is supposed to be in a category of safe seat that should essentially render it uncompetitive. The fact that it isn't is a damning indictment of Labour's time in office.

Nor the people bearing the brunt of foreign aid cuts

if only we had a media and culture secretary @roberthutton.co.uk

Trippier and Shearer on Howe #NUFC

Went into “Wuthering Heights” with an open mind. I really don’t mind adaptations that take liberties with source material. But it is just a very hollow film and does not deserve to do as well as it obviously will.

Means a lot to him. It’s not a man that’s given up or lost the dressing room. #nufc

Is it just me that reads this as uhh not perhaps supportive

Presumably it will have to be an internal appointment to replace McSweeney because no one will give up an external job to work for a PM so clearly on the edge himself.

I think whether the job is structurally impossible is important to ask. But in this case the Chief of Staff was clearly unfit for the job: he only understood politics through the lens of petty Labour factionalism which is why he pushed for Mandelson and advised the PM to keep punching at their base.

Good. The UK is not a big CLP to have fun fighting factional battles with.

Starmer's moment of reckoning Where is the competent boring government we were promised?

This—by @iandunt.bsky.social—is the best thing I’ve read on the implications of this week’s shitshow for UK government, diplomacy and democracy

Reform has been warned that defecting Tories will damage its brand – and the first evidence is in Conservative voters have become more positive about Reform since the defections – but some Reform voters have been turned off.

My thoughts on what is (and isn't) at risk for Reform in becoming "Tory Party 2.0", given recent polling, the dynamics of bloc politics, and the party's popularity with 2024 non-voters: theconversation.com/reform-has-b...

Starmer faces questions over visit to Palantir office alongside Mandelson Former ambassador was also shareholder in lobbying group that counted US tech firm as a client

New on FT website:

Downing Street has refused to say whether Sir Keir Starmer knew Palantir was a client of Peter Mandelson’s lobbying firm when they both visited the company in Washington last February — ahead of it winning a £240mn UK government contract.

www.ft.com/content/5bba...

They will also be inheriting a multi-year spending plan which has baked in real term spending cuts for most departments by 2028 just as the next election approaches...

BREAKING: McSweeney’s think tank paid PR firm to investigate journalists Labour Together put private investigators onto journalists writing about its funding. Starmer's right-hand man knew.

🔴 BREAKING: Labour Together paid controversial PR firm £30k to investigate journalists who were digging into how its undeclared funding

Reporters from Sunday Times, Guardian and other outlets targetted

*And* Morgan McSweeney knew about it

Full story:
democracyforsale.substack.com/p/exclusive-...

This is the right take. The Tories now have the chance to explain why a race-baiter and authoritarian grifter like Jenrick belongs with Reform and not them. Will they take it? Almost certainly not. As Stephen says, they see Reform as lost family rather than a distinct and dangerous political foe.

Very easy to lose perspective. It was an amazing year.

We may end thd weekend in 15th place. #NUFC