“Snog, Marry, Avoid?”
That’s the cleanest version of the sometimes disapproved of social trifecta occasionally played amongst friends and colleagues. It can be more extreme, and is usually accompanied by a drink.
Political commentary has an altogether more boring version.
“Stunt, Job, or Crackers”?
Essentially it promotes debate, more often than not a retrospective prism – to take any aggression or activism out of the moment – to decide was a specific manoeuvre a political stunt, just doing the job, or so bizarre that everyone shrugs and admits probably even the person themselves isn’t sure.
I’ll be honest and I have no personal axe to grind against the man, but Rehman Chishti’s leadership bid in July 2022 is my personal favourite for the latter category.
That’s not why we are here though.
The Prime Minister, laughingly shrugged off the prospect of a vote, called by the Opposition, as to whether he should be investigated by the Parliamentary Privileges Committee by saying
“it’s a political stunt ahead of local elections”.
Well now, that old game really becomes quite useful.
Let’s assume one man’s political stunt ahead of elections, can be, depending on one’s political perspective one woman’s holding a Prime Minister to account ahead of desperate attempts to shut Parliament down – prorogation – as soon as possible to stop the damaging scrutiny.
Now yes, I hear the noises off ‘nobody cares now’, ‘they aren’t talking about this in the ‘Spoons in Macclesfield’ – but hush, that’s not immediately relevant.
Whether one believes the whole Mandelson saga is of interest to the public it was undoubtedly in the public interest for the leader of the Official Opposition to pursue it.
A Prime Minister and his party, if they were so very convinced he’d done absolutely nothing wrong – specifically misleading Parliament by, accidentally or not, insisting due process had been followed and no pressure was put on civil servants over the Mandelson saga – then why would they fight it, and with a three line whip which screams weakness not strength. Another political reason for an opposition to do it.
For Kemi Badenoch, firstly holding the Prime Minister to account is literally her job. If in pursuit of that she over eggs it, and public opinion turns sympathetic to the Pm, well then that’s on her, but as James Crouch of Opinium showed us this week, that’s really not the case.
So is she doing it because it’s good for her? No, but she’d be daft if she hadn’t noticed that it has been. She also believes as do many voters who’d already made up their mind on the whole Mandelson farrago, that she’s simply been spotlighting the in built weaknesses in this Prime Minister, his judgement and his trend of making others pay for his mistakes.
Find me an opposition that doesn’t try to do that. Stunt? No. Politically advantageous? Yes, but then I wonder who’d used the exact same parliamentary device before against a Tory Prime Minister who didn’t – probably couldn’t by that stage – whip the backbenches to save him. I’ve said it before ‘it’s the hypocrisy that kills you’
Let’s turn to the elections next week.
Really significant in many ways, and braced as Conservatives are for some difficult results. My predication has been a bad night for us, but not as bad as it had looked some months back. A good night for Reform, but not as good as they’ve trumpeted some months back. And an awful night for Labour. Good for Greens, not bad for Lib Dems. We’ll see.
Starmer’s comment about a stunt ‘just before elections’ supposes in one way that a ‘stunt’ is one thing, but it’s ‘simply not cricket’ to deploy it just ahead of going to the polls.
Alright, for the sake of argument, because I don’t agree, but let’s say it was a stunt; a bit of political theatre to make a Prime Minister who looks bad already look worse, because there are potentially votes in it. Then I’m sorry the ‘ahead of elections’ bit is a canard.
Not nearly all the documents about the Mandelson appointment promised after the Opposition – the official one not the one that claims it is- forced that release have actually been released. Held back ahead of elections?
Bridgit Phillipson’s reluctance to publish statutory guidance to organisations on how to implement the Supreme court judgement on trans rights and biological sex, which was months and months ago, has been widely pinned her holding back ahead of elections.
Indeed if you remember Labour tried very hard – and yes, a small number of Tory Councils too – to cancel these elections ahead of these elections!
I’m not suggesting these are ‘stunts’, but they are deliberate political manoeuvres ahead of elections you are worried you are going to get pummelled in.
Well, despite quite a lot of pressure and political connivance the fact is the PM couldn’t quite get Parliament prorogued before one last PMQs of the session, but now they are off away into the country, and everything, but everything is now about those elections.
So important are they to some that they didn’t even turn up for the last scenes of the drama on the Parliamentary stage. Deliberately not voting on a motion because it was highly unlikely to be won, is an argument, but funnily enough the one Reform angrily dismissed when some Tories didn’t vote for their utterly doomed ammendment to ‘leave the ECHR’, which was so doomed it was, dare one say, ‘a political stunt’.
It’s odd trying eight times to get a job, that you then don’t think there’s much point doing properly, but then there’s an acute political calculus going on there. All parties employ it at times, and Labour as I’ve just shown don’t have a leg to stand when accusing others of it.
Parliament is now in recess. The game is truly afoot, and expect a lot of local election related material coming your way.