When trying to make sense of what is happening inside Jeremy Corbyn’s office, most Westminster commentators rely on a familiar formula: “the four Ms”. What the Labour leader says or does, the thinking goes, is best understood as deriving from the influence of four members of his inner circle: Len McCluskey, the general secretary of Unite, Andrew Murray, McCluskey’s chief of staff, Seumas Milne, Corbyn’s director of communications and strategy, and Karie Murphy, his chief of staff.
Neat though it is, the formula was never entirely accurate. Now it is redundant. On 8 October, Murphy was abruptly moved from her role running Corbyn’s office to the Labour Party’s HQ, where she will notionally oversee the party’s next election campaign. Official briefings insisted it was business as usual. But her enforced departure marks the beginning of a new phase in Corbyn’s leadership.
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