Bruised and battered over the economy, with tax rises and spending cuts looming in November’s Budget, Rachel Reeves is at least able to celebrate one unexpected success. The Chancellor has achieved what once seemed impossible, bringing back together the split Milibands, Ed and David. A friend of the Milibrothers revealed Energy Secretary Ed and New York-exiled humanitarian boss David are finally back on speaking terms, closing the painful rift that opened when they ran against each other in Labour’s 2010 leadership contest. Ed won and proved unimpressive; race favourite David furiously quit parliament and the country. The catch for Reeves is that a shared concern over her “very right-wing” Treasury orthodoxy is the bridge-builder between the Milibrothers.
Incarcerating Durham pit village lad Jonathan Reynolds in the chief whip’s office deprives Keir Starmer of one of his better communicators on TV. The former Business Secretary was privately spoken of as a potential future leader by admiring cabinet colleagues – warm praise that may have inadvertently sealed a cold fate in the reshuffle. Rebellious talk at the annual TUC congress in Brighton was of disaffiliation should Reynolds’ ultra-Blairite successor Peter Kyle dilute proposed better job rights to appease an increasingly assertive business lobby. One comrade whispered the fate of Brother Reynolds might have been sealed by a surprisingly decent relationship with Sharon Graham, the disputatious Unite firebrand bitingly hostile to virtually all other ministers.
Noticeably absent from Reform’s conspiracy-fest in Birmingham was the Mrs Tiggy-Winkle figure of Ann Widdecombe, seemingly cast aside by Nigel Farage for fresher and younger Conservative recruits in the shape of Andrea Jenkyn and Nadine Dorries. Widders was the star of the show a year ago, prowling the stage to incite the Reform army and bring down the house. Overshadowing the egomaniac in charge was an unforgiven sin in the eyes of Reform’s limelight-hogging autocrat. Relegated Widders declined an invitation to sit on a panel with other women. In with the new, out with the old – hard right-style.
Her arm possibly aching after it was twisted behind her back, Education Secretary Bridget Phillipson has thrown her hat into the ring to be Labour deputy leader. Her patsy candidacy triggered a discussion over what the perfect politician would look like. Liz Kendall once opined they’d have the brain of Torsten Bell and heart of Alison McGovern. Now that she’s Science Secretary, surely Kendall could have boffins build a Torsten McGovern or Alison Bell avatar to save the government.
With his second job earnings including £100,000 a year from GB News, on top of his £93,904 MP’s salary, Reform’s perma-tanned 30p Lee Anderson doesn’t need to practice what he preached about cooking infeasibly cheap meals. My snout observed the Ashfield ranter in the Lords cafe devouring a lamb pasty lunch with all the trimmings costing £6.90 – 23 times what he claimed the poorest could live off. “Anderson looked so angry when he was eating,” observed my snout, “that it was like watching a hippo chow down by the banks of the Zambezi.” One is a large, barrel-shaped danger and the other a semi-aquatic mammal.
Unveiling his latest plan to skill up Brits for green jobs, Ed Milibrother declared: “Britain’s clean energy future will be powered by secure, unionised jobs for local people right across the country.” Hmmm. Disgruntled trade union snouts point out that one particular pal of the Prime Minister, Greg Jackson, doesn’t seem to have got the memo. His energy company, Octopus – which prides itself on its green and social credentials – hasn’t recognised a union, and even eschews an HR department. Awks, particularly as Jackson has just been appointed as a government adviser. Perhaps Ed should have a word. Up the workers!
Barred from re-standing in 2024 by a suspension that conveniently allowed Labour fixers to parachute Starmtrooper Chris Ward into Brighton Kemptown, Lloyd Russell-Moyle has returned to campfires away from front-line politics. The one-time elfin is now chief executive of the Woodcraft Folk, paramilitary wing of the co-op movement. Jeremy Corbyn and, before Eton changed the crowd he mixed with, the Tory shadow Commons leader Jesse Norman are former members of the cuddly group. Bring those two together and the Mole, as LRM is known, would really be linking hands to sing songs.
Spare a thought for Peter Mandelson. His ten-page 2003 birthday message to the late convicted paedophile Jeffrey Epstein was enthusiastically tweeted out by ITV’s Robert Peston, with each tweet more embarrassing than the last for our man in Washington. Peston did gild the lily slightly for Mandelson though, half quoting a remark the ambassador made to the Financial Times in February to the effect that he regrets ever being introduced to Epstein. The full quote? “I’m not going to go into this. It’s an FT obsession and frankly you can all fuck off. OK?” And they say diplomats need to be charming…
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[See also: Boris can still win]
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This article appears in the 10 Sep 2025 issue of the New Statesman, The Fight Back
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