This surely must be a spoof… but then maybe not. An American intern in the Labour Party press office at the height of a crisis. It’s brilliant… It seems to be the work of one Kristian Hoysradt and was originally called KHoys in London. Whether it’s a spoof or not I can only urge Kristian to carry on. It is a work of pure genius.
I managed to save the posting below before the whole blog just disappeared in a puff of smoke:
Monday, October 15, 2007
First Days in the Labour Party Press Office
Last Monday, I went for my “interview” with the Labour Party Press Office on Monday. As it turned out, it wasn’t so much an interview as it was me walking in, and them introducing me to my internship that I had already locked up. I’m literally working under the Press Communications Director of the Labour Party of the UK. When I came in at 4pm, the woman, Jo Murray, said she just had a briefing with Prime Minister Gordon Brown earlier in the day. Pretty sweet. Important to note though, that Monday was probably the worst day in the last decade for the Labour Party in Britain. The day before was when PM Brown called off the election, and the press and opposition party had just destroyed the Labour Party in the newspapers and on TV all day.
And so came Thursday, my first day on the job at the Press Office. This happened to be the day after Wednesday’s Question Time of the Prime Minister by the House of Commons. Unlike in the US where the President is very rarely take on one-on-one by a member of Congress, in the UK, the PM is a member of their legislative body, and thus has to answer questions directly posed by the Members of Parliament in the House every Wednesday for a half hour. But this Question Time was special, because it was the first time the PM had to face the opposition party after pretty much screwing up the election, and blowing whatever lead the Labour Party had in the polls. If you’ve never seen Question Time, YOU NEED TO WATCH THIS ONE. One of the people on the Press Team said it was probably the most entertaining Question Time he had ever seen. I can only describe it in terms of a US political debate, by having you image Lewis Black or Howard Dean (who would play David Cameron in this case) take on George Dubbya (Gordon Brown in this case) on the floor of the House of Representatives with either party sitting in the Chamber shouting both of them on. This really was a classic and I recommend you watch it. At the end, you might wish that we could put President Bush in this situation. But then again, he probably would’ve been booed out of the position his first month in to office if he had to do this:
https://www.number10.gov.uk/output/page306.asp
So after that ownage of Gordon Brown and the Labour Party on Wednesday, things were pretty glum on my first day in the Press Office on Thursday. Not exactly the best day to start things up. But all in all, it seems like its going to start off with the basic internship essentials…answering phones, going through the newspapers for important headlines for staff, getting Tea (a task which someone had to show me which was sort of embarrassing lol) I mean, as it is with most internships, the thing you gain most is the all around environmental experience–being in the office with these important people, observing how they act and how they respond to the press and to the party, what they do on a daily basis, who they meet with, how they work with the rest of the party etc. This is only their second intern the Press Office has ever taken on, so its a little intimidating. By then end, they want to have me responding to the press on behalf of the Labour Party, which is a little scary, but I’m looking forward to starting up again after break and really getting a taste of what it is to work for the Labour Party of the UK.
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