The workers, disunited, will never be divided
To the workers' soviet in Brighton, otherwise known as the Trades Union Congress. The bruvvers and sisters were in poisonous mood, David Cameron barely getting a mention. Venom was reserved for Gordon Brown, plus comrades in other unions. The exception was Unite - or DisUnited, as the country's biggest union should be renamed. The joint nigglers Derek Simpson and Tony Woodley, the labour movement's Jack Lemmon and Walter Matthau, did a passable impression of detesting each other. Friction between the Odd Couple is destined to cascade down the generations: DisUnited lost its card so was unable to cast a 1.5 million block vote in favour of public sector pay strikes. Cue Woodley's shadow, Len McCluskey, and Simpson's favourite, Graham Goddard, both touted as successors, immediately being blamed by the rival camp for the fiasco. The workers, DisUnited, will always be squabbling, it seems.
That Bond-loving man of the people, Druggie Dave, was a spin doctor's nightmare on his holiday yacht, where the Old Etonian was snapped perusing Milton's Paradise Lost and accused of going highbrow. Now, Cameron's people insisted it wasn't John Milton's epic 17th-century poem on the fall of man but Paradise Lost by another Milton - Giles Milton - a tale of the 20th-century destruction of a Muslim city. Hardly a potboiler, though Boris Johnson may be reassured to learn he remains the only member of the Brideshead set prepared to admit publicly that he enjoys difficult reads.
Charles Clarke is lucky his head is still on his shoulders after he stuck his jug ears over the parapet to call for the Supreme Leader to go.
A party stalwart at a Yorkshire Labour shout-a-thon in Wakefield took a dim view of the former minister's rebellion. "I'd bring back the death penalty for disloyal MPs," yelled the Tyke, "starting with Charles Clarke."
Disturbingly, muttered my mole, the volunteer hangman was cheered.
Back to the TUC, where a pause in the hate-fest heard the GMB bulldozer Paul Kenny declaring that a union or cabinet cabal mustn't seek to topple the Prime Minister. Can he be the same Mr Kenny who in July called for Gordie's head? I trust the bulldozer's change of direction has nothing to do with the arch-fixer seeking a deal to represent 5,000 screws in Jack "The Lad" Straw's Titan prisons.
That owlish Lib Dem Alan Beith has sent out invitations for a small drinks party at the yellow peril's sandalfest in Bournemouth, in order to launch a volume of his musings. The Berwick Bore is considered one of the dullest chaps in Westminster. Beith is also a Methodist teetotaller. Should be quite a bash.
Kevin Maguire is associate editor (politics) of the Daily Mirror
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