by Peter Watt
I don’t know what’s wrong with me this week. I just feel miserable. I have even got to the point that I can barely be bothered to tweet, and that really is a bad sign. But why am I feeling flat now? I mean, for months now, I have been worried about what seemed to be the direction of travel of the party with dog whistles to the left. For months I have worried that the outcomes of the party reform debate would be a damp squib. And for months I have worried that we seemed to be all but leaderless.
So on that basis, surely in the last few weeks things have started to look up? Ed has begun to define himself and his philosophy of “social justice with a hard edge” and an end to the “take what you can culture”. And he has shown real leadership on party reform by demanding an end to elections to the shadow cabinet and hinting at reforming the relationship with the trade unions. For me, these still don’t go far enough and probably could have, and should have, been said months ago. And, crucially, we still have little or no credibility on the economy.
But it absolutely has to be welcomed, and with four years to go until the next general election it is a start. Despite some people feeling uncomfortable about the new approach, on the whole the party seems buoyed after a difficult few months. David Cameron has looked rattled at PMQs and the U-turn taunts hurt because they reflect a very real problem for him and his government. We can probably relax just a bit until conference season. The beach beckons. (more…)