Diane Abbott is in Scotland for the next week or so, trying to gather support for her leadership bid.
Far be it from me to comment on Labour's internal affairs, but if Diane Abbott has anything in her favour it's that she is the only left wing candidate in the field. There might be shades of difference between the others, but they're all straight out of the new Labour mold.
In this interview with the Herald, she explains why she's now concentrating on Scotland:
Ms Abbott, the MP for Hackney North and Stoke Newington in London, will visit Glasgow and Edinburgh as part of her visit, taking in meetings with Scottish trade union leaders and speaking at Holyrood’s Festival of Politics.
“I think I have a lot of potential support in Scotland,” she said, adding that she was the only leadership candidate of the left. “I think what I am saying about things like the role of the private sector is much more in tune with Scottish Labour than what a lot of the other candidates are saying. But I need to get my message across.
“I have not spent a week and a half in Wales. I genuinely think the Scottish Labour party has always had a very fundamental role in British Labour politics. In a way the Scottish Labour movement is the keeper of the flame when it comes to socialism. I think whoever wins (in Scotland) deserves to win overall.”
I'm not sure whether or not to thank Diane for her decision not to bother with Wales. Of course it shows that Wales is of little importance to her party, but that's not news. The more telling thing is that she does not regard the Labour Party in Wales as having any particularly left wing credentials. Who can blame her for that? Just look at the sort of MPs that Labour now picks to fight seats in Wales.
Or perhaps she knows more than she lets on. With her consistent opposition to things such as the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and for being against Trident, and for greater fairness in society and narrowing rather than widening the gap between rich and poor, spending time here might make it rather obvious that her views are much more in line with those of Plaid Cymru than with anyone in the Labour Party in Wales. She might be staying out of Wales in order not to embarrass them.
2 comments:
Obviously meant for a Scottish audience!
"In a way the Scottish Labour movement is the keeper of the flame when it comes to socialism"
Who does she have in mind I wonder? John Reid, Gordon Brown, Helen Liddell, Alistair Darling ...
Few of the left would dispute that King amongst Scottish Socialists was the sadly departed Jimmy Reid. - Oh hang on, he Left Labour in 1994 when Blair took over, and joined the SNP in 2005!
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