Author: robert.marchant

Interesting debate going on over at LabourList between Darrell Goodliffe and Mark Ferguson on whether or not Ken has damaged the Party and should be disciplined over his support of independent candidate Lutfur Rahman. The answer is, of course, that Ken has never really been a member of the Labour Party. Oh, he’s had a… Continue reading Up to his old tricks?

Well congratulations to my friends in Islington – not only won back the council in May, but now also a great result for Islington women. Mary Creagh (former LG leader) and Meg Hillier (former councillor and LGA member) are both in the Shadow Cabinet and Emily Thornberry (MP) missed it by a whisker. Ed has… Continue reading Shadow cabinets – and this one

So, after the speech, we now have a much clearer idea of what kind of leader Ed Miliband will be. With regard to the three points from my last post, he’s doing ok. Does he have a vision? Yes, I think he does. Although it borrows ideas from New Labour, it’s a shift. And despite… Continue reading Ed’s defining week

Well, it was always going to be one of them. Good luck to Ed as he takes on a very tough job. As regular readers will know, I supported David, but I’m not so churlish as to believe that no-one else can do the job, especially someone with not dissimilar politics (as, in fact, 4… Continue reading The right Miliband?

Look, I understand the need of the leadership candidates to move the debate on. I understand the need to acknowledge that we had an electoral defeat (albeit, in historic terms, a very narrow one) and change course. I also understand that in the Party at large, there is a groundswell of opinion which has never… Continue reading Can we just remember?

According to the list of CLP nominations in today on Labourlist from my former colleague Luke Akehurst, there are only two horses in the race. Although from MP nominations it may have seemed this way for some time, these were a fairly poor indicator, IMHO. After all, how much difference is it likely to make… Continue reading Battle of the Millibands

Harriet Harman yesterday backed off on plans to introduce quotas into the Shadow Cabinet elections. Thank God for that. We would really have started to look foolish in front of the electorate we are hoping will vote us back before long. You see, we forget that the preoccupations of a small number of members of… Continue reading Harriet backs off

Yesterday at IESE, Barcelona I had the privilege of listening to possibly the most well-known of all social entrepreneurs, Prof. Mohammed Yunus of the Grameen Bank, Bangladesh. More or less single-handedly inventing the concept of microcredits, and helping millions of people in the process set up businesses. A lot of people are tagged “inspirational speaker”… Continue reading Social entrepreneurship – from the horse’s mouth

Spain, a country dear to my heart, is in trouble. Not from its unreformed labour laws and resulting two-tier labour market, its borrowing binges on cheap Euro interest rates or even its burst property bubble, the combination of which has resulted in an astonishing 20% unemployment – although none of these have helped the situation.… Continue reading Trouble still looming in the sun

Ah, the “new politics”, where all political misbehaviour was to come to an end. Oh, for the bright halcyon days of early May. It was good while it lasted – about 18 days – wasn’t it?