The Labour leadership contest having drawn to a close, many of the candidates other than hard leftist Jeremy Corbyn have already half-conceded defeat, with the winner due to be announced sometime on Saturday.
Whilst pols make a habit of playing nice with each other in public, in private they are not so polite. And Andy Burnham, at one time the frontrunner in the contest and still a potential shadow minister, is unimpressed with the way the election has gone:
“Privately, it is a disaster for the Labour party. I mean, publicly, he is a nice man, a nice individual. He believes in the things he campaigns on so he’s not a fraud in any way. But I think the public will think Labour has given up on ever being a government again.”
The footage was shot in an undercover sting by the Sun, which at least one cynic has suggested might be motivated by Burnham’s record standing up for victims’ families in the Hillsborough disaster.
Even so, there is clearly now some distance between Corbyn’s rivals and the rest of the Labour party, whose ranks have swelled in the wake of the general election to some 550,000 members, affiliated supporters and registered supporters.
All of which is awkward, given the safe bet is that Corbyn will be crowned on Saturday.
Image Credit – Andy Burnham, FT Summer Party 2015
