A clever move
James Cleverly MP withdrew his leadership candidacy citing a lack of support for his campaign which required “a leap of faith to skip a generation and vote for a new MP.” It is also worth noting that since then Mr Cleverly has announced that he is backing Boris Johnson for leader which makes one wonder what he has been promised in a Johnson lead administration.
Welcome to Peterborough: The mother of all marginals
In the run up to the Peterborough by-election every political pundit and commentator predicted that the Brexit Party would win the election but as luck would have it Labour held the seat with a slight increase in its majority. Whilst this is a small victory for the Labour Party the real winners are the Brexit Party who took a lot of votes from both the Conservatives and UKIP and as the mother of all marginals, its anyone’s guess how future elections and by elections will pan out.
Scottish Labour Party back a second referendum
In what many will regard as the mother of all political U turns following a poll that suggested the Scottish Labour Party faced annihilation at the next general election, the Scottish Labour Party has announced that it supports a second referendum.
This policy shift will put Richard Leonard, Leader of Scottish Labour Party at odds with Jeremy Corbyn who is still struggling to convey what the Labour Party’s position on Brexit is. /
Leonard who is a strong supporter of Corbyn has faced criticism of the policy shift with critics saying it’s an un principled move that stinks of desperation and will legitimise the prospect of a second independence referendum in Scotland, but to those in the Shadow Cabinet who advocated such a move it will be perceived as a positive turning point that will resonate well with the people of Scotland.
The Gaffanator
Scottish Labour MP Hugh Gaffney attended a Scottish Affairs Committee event in Canada in which he spoke about the possibility of Scotland becoming an independent country. His remarks sparked controversy in what many have regarded as the Gaffanator making another gaff as he did last year over comments about Robert Burns that resulted him in having to attend equality and diversity training.
In his attempt to convey what many people in Scotland have said about the real prospect of a hard Brexiteer becoming the next PM, for some people in Scotland that will be enough for them to vote for independence, but it will up to party’s such as Labour for making the case for the union.
Cocaine
Since Rory Stewart’s admission that he smoked opium whilst attending a wedding in Iran every Tory leadership hopeful has come out of the woodwork to talk about their own drugs experience. First up was Michael Gove who commented that he took cocaine on several occasions as a young journalist and stressed this was before he knew he was going into public office, Andrea Leadsom said that she had smoked cannabis and that MP’s deserve to have a private life before being in office, Jeremy Hunt said he had a cannabis laced lassi whilst travelling in India as a student and Tory heavyweight, Boris Johnson said he tried cocaine and sneezed. Perhaps next week we will see a firm commitment from Tory leadership contenders to reforming current UK drug laws.