Given the all-clear by the police, the forthright deputy Labour leader yesterday grabbed her metaphorical mojo and swung it menacingly in the direction of Keir Starmer.
There is no other way to interpret Rayner’s dramatic intervention on Diane Abbott’s side in the row that threatens to wreck Starmer’s hitherto obstacle-free path to No 10. Her power has been turbo-charged by her vindication in the council house tax row, and she is not afraid to use it. Abbott should be allowed to stand as a Labour candidate, she declared.
We know what she means. Abbott is a trailblazer, a socialist, a firebrand. All terms that, coincidentally, might apply to Rayner, too. The deputy Labour leader is, in addition, in a strong position as a forceful and charismatic political operator, ready to take advantage of the unhappiness at all levels of the party over the ruthlessness of the purge of candidates considered to be insufficiently loyal to Keir Starmer.
Rayner didn’t have to spell it out. Abbott’s case has not been handled well, Rayner told the lunchtime news: “I don’t think there’s any reason why she shouldn’t stand as an MP,” she said. Everybody can read the code: the “boys” in the leader’s office have gone too far.
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