Dan Hodges « Labour Uncut

Posts Tagged ‘Dan Hodges’

On the eve of greatness, a memento mori for English cricket

02/01/2011, 01:25:06 PM

by Dan Hodges

A few years ago, Kevin Pietersen nearly killed me. It wasn’t personal. I was looking for my sandwich; he was looking to hook Brett Lee into row 20 of the Peter May stand at the Oval. I didn’t find my sandwich, but he found the stand.

Two seats to the right, and I would have been a tragic footnote to England’s historic 2005 Ashes triumph. I sometimes wonder if there would have been a moment’s silence for me in Trafalgar Square; a poignant pause before Vic Flowers led Andrew Flintoff in a drunken rendition of Jerusalem. Knowing Vic and Freddie, probably not.

Tonight, England’s cricketers take to the field for the most important cricket match since that fateful, near fatal, day. “What madness is this”, goes the cry. “The cricketing Rubicon was successfully forded a week ago, in Melbourne. We saw the cheers, the tears, the cream of English youth dancing the sprinkler in front of delirious men dressed as Arthurian knights and Camilla Parker-Bowles”.

Wrong. The Ashes have not been won. Merely retained. (more…)

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2011: the year in review

31/12/2010, 01:00:54 PM

by Dan Hodges

2011. What a twelve months it’s been. Tweaking the nose of convention. Hurling itself robustly into the face of popular wisdom. The year of living counter-intuitively.

It started, of course, with the amazing scenes from the Oldham & Saddleworth by-election. Tory activists barring the way to the polling stations for known Conservative voters. David Cameron, in yellow rosette, claiming that his great grandfather was best friends with Lloyd George. Ken Clarke, in sandals, and ill-fitting “Save the Whale” t-shirt, urging voters to “hold your nose, close your eyes, and vote Lib Dem”.

All to no avail. Labour: 25,000; Tories: 15,000; Lib Dems: 133. “A wake up call”, said Nick Clegg.

Oldham & Saddleworth only heralded the start of the electoral drama. There were the unprecedented seventeen by-elections held after Labour MPs convicted of erroneously charging paper clips to their expenses were each sentenced to 13 years imprisonment. Their decision to appeal their convictions was widely condemned by the media. “These paper clip thieving ratbags just don’t get it”, raged Richard Littlejohn. “Hanging’s too good for the scum”. (more…)

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A reckoning for the second rate: the Lib Dems are simply not qualified to govern

24/12/2010, 07:00:10 AM

by Dan Hodges

In his classic work Fever Pitch, the book that finally enabled middle class supporters to emerge from the football closet, Nick Hornby devotes a whole chapter to a single player, Gus Caesar.

Caesar’s place in literary history was secured in the eighty third minute of the 1988 League Cup final between Arsenal and Luton. With his side 2-1 up, the England under-21 defender chased down an innocuous ball in his own penalty area. Then something strange happened.

Some say he was distracted by a Luton striker who had moved goal side of him. Others that his studs became caught in the Wembley turf. Whatever the reason, with the option of sliding a pass to a colleague, or launching the ball to safety, he chose to do neither. Gus Caesar simply fell over. A melée ensued, in which Luton scrambled an equaliser. They went on to snatch a late winner and raise the trophy. Caesar was swiftly transferred, never playing in the top flight of football again. (more…)

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The left is losing its marbles

21/12/2010, 07:00:06 AM

by Dan Hodges

I’ve taken Tom Watson’s advice. I’ve poured myself a stiff drink, kicked back and raised a festive glass to Ed Miliband.

But nothing’s happened. I waited for the warm glow. A mellow wave of positive reflection to engulf me. Nothing.

Try as I might, I cannot conjure up the magic. The excitement. The anticipation. The child-like optimism. Like the boy in the Polar Express, I no longer believe.

I wish I could. I wish I could see the things that others see. Ed striding up Downing Street, waving to the cheering crowds. Len McCluskey, Charles Kennedy and Charlie Gilmour locked in a sublime embrace of unity and comradeship. New foreign secretary Chuka Umunna, chancellor David Miliband and community rehabilitation secretary Ed Balls applauding his arrival.

There is the audacity of hope. And there is the sleep of reason. We have ended the year succumbing to the latter. (more…)

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The week Uncut

18/12/2010, 10:30:18 AM

In case you missed them, these were the best read pieces on Uncut in the last seven days:

Tom Watson offers a Christmas toast to the leader

Michael Dugher says replacing nanny with nudge is no joke

Dan Hodges interviews the shadow defence secretary, Jim Murphy

Stella Creasy says together we can make the government act on legal loan sharking

Peter Watt says that we don’t have the time to be rational

Kevin Meagher thinks Coronation Street is a Tory conspiracy

Tory local government leader lets slip contempt for the north

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Music. Celtic. Rome. Dan Hodges interviews Jim Murphy

17/12/2010, 12:00:44 PM

by Dan Hodges???

To the untrained eye, Jim Murphy’s office shuns convention. A guitar propped casually in the corner. Football memorabilia on prominent display. A large framed photograph of America’s first Roman catholic president, Jack Kennedy.

Uncut knows better. Music. Celtic. Rome. The holy trinity of the Scottish left.

At a time of upheaval in the party and the country, Labour’s shadow defence secretary is radically conformist. While Ed Miliband was meeting the teenage leaders of the EMA protest, Jim Murphy was rubbing shoulders with some of the stiffest collars in Westminster. (more…)

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I am not a Lab Dem. I am a free man.

14/12/2010, 07:00:16 AM

by Dan Hodges

Still they come. Nick Clegg’s tired, hungry, huddled masses. The Liberal Democrat refugees.

Labour is providing them with sanctuary. Of the 30,000 new members who have joined the party since the election, almost a third of them are reportedly former Lib Dem members.

The pace of the relief operation is set to intensify. The Sunday Times carried “a bold appeal” from Ed Miliband for “disaffected Liberal Democrat MPs to join the opposition to the coalition”. There are rumors that the shadow cabinet is preparing a charity re-mix of the Red Flag in time for Christmas. Billy Bragg is considering a “Lib Aid” concert at the O2.

OK, I made up those last bits. But our tanks are no longer parked on Clegg’s lawn. They’ve bulldozed through the French windows and are rumbling towards the dinning room.

In the wake of the tuition fees debacle, it may appear to be a sound strategy. The Lib Dems are a broken party. Just look at Vince Cable. At the start of the year he was one of the brightest stars in the political firmament. Standing at the dispatch box on Thursday, attempting to justify his tuition fee betrayal, he resembled one of the Germans at the end of Raiders of the Lost Ark who have unleashed the furies of the covenant. It was as if the life force were being sucked from his body. (more…)

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Let’s not defend our record – it’s been trashed by the voters.

10/12/2010, 07:00:17 AM

by Dan Hodges

Oh how we laughed at the new socialism. Ed Miliband leaping like Nijinsky to embrace the “audacious reinvention” of his party. A cacophony of explosions: irresponsible capitalism, the financial crash, the illusion of the third way. Our stressed, stretched insecurities soothed by the mellow balm of the good society.

Neal Lawson and John Harris’ New Statesman essay initially bordered on self-parody, then thought “to hell with it” and stormed across the border with a full cavalry division and accompanying regimental band. “Whereas New Labour tried to bend people’s aspirations to their resigned and deflated worldview, the new paradigm seeks to grasp our hopes and fears”. To summarise, the new socialism involves closing Bluewater, reading the Gruffalo more often to our kids and ensuring that a cleaner in Vladivostock earns the same as one in Clapham. For what it’s worth I’m against the first, for the second and haven’t a clue how to achieve the third.

Comrade Lawson has many qualities, but self-awareness isn’t amongst them. I once laughed out loud when I received an e-mail urging me to purchase his book on the perils of consumerism at a special discount price. (more…)

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The man behind the (temporary) moustache: Dan Hodges interviews John Healey

07/12/2010, 11:59:09 AM

It’s eight fifteen in the morning, and John Healey has a date with destiny. For a month Labour’s shadow health secretary has been sporting a moustache proud enough to stand comparison with a Sopwith Camel ace or Clement Atlee. But today the “mo” must go.

“It’s my contribution to Movember, the campaign to raise prostate cancer awareness. I was pretty shocked when I took over the health brief to discover the mortality rate from the disease. It’s treatable, but so many men leave it too late”.

A worthy cause. But down in the depths of the House of Commons barbers the fundraising for the prostate cancer charity hits a snag. Kelly the hairdresser bears bad tidings.

“I’m sorry Mr Healey, but I won’t be able to do it. I can’t use a razor”.

No razor. In a barbers?

“No. So sorry. Health and safety”.

John Healey elevates a quizzical eyebrow. “I’m going to have to raise this with Lord Young”. (more…)

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The Battle for Barking: good television – bad politics

03/12/2010, 12:00:19 PM

by Dan Hodges

The Battle for Barking, broadcast on More4 earlier this week, made for compelling viewing. Award-winning documentary maker, Laura Fairrie, spent a year “embedded” with the Margaret Hodge and BNP campaigns as they fought house by house, street by street, for control of the constituency and the council.

I was in Barking for part of that campaign as well. My job was to manage the press on behalf of Hope not Hate. I spent some of that time dealing with Laura Fairrie.

She’s a talented documentary maker. And a brave one. At best, the BNP are instinctively suspicious and hostile towards the media. At their worst, they turn violent.

Laura Fairrie didn’t infiltrate them as such. She wasn’t filming under cover. What she did was much harder. She got them to accept her. Then trust her. By then end, they had come to like her. There’s a telling moment at Griffin’s campaign launch when the BNP’s Bob Bailey asks for questions, and says, “Let’s start with Laura”. It’s said with undisguised affection. “They’ve had such terrible experiences with the media and film makers”, Laura told the Guardian. (more…)

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