At the hustings during the election campaign, when I asserted the strength of the economy, it was greeted with laughter and distain. So, when the Gross Domestic Product numbers were published last week, confirming further economic growth ahead of the rest of the G7, and the headline was ‘boost for Starmer’ : the irony was not lost on me.
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I am sorry to have lost so many diligent and committed colleagues at the election, many of whom will now have to find employment to support their families. I used to meet with a dozen colleagues on a Tuesday morning for a short Bible study. Alas only two of us have survived.
I suppose that its very nature, politics is a risky career and politicians go into it knowing the odds.
Any career, profession, or employment can end in disappointment, defeat, and failure. Perhaps the only real difference with politics is that such defeats are attended with the glare of publicity.
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Ironically, another group of politicians for whom I have a great deal of sympathy are the thirty or so Labour front-benchers who slogged it through the hard years in opposition, only to find that they have not been rewarded with a position in government.
Opposition is a thankless task for a shadow minister, you are on your own marking your government opposite number, but without the special advisers and civil service back-up that your minister enjoys. You will spend your weekends travelling, at your own expense, to make a speech somewhere in the vain hope that someone is going to take any notice of what you have to say. I know, I did twelve years of it. To have done it faithfully, but not to have been rewarded with a government red box, will be a bitter pill to swallow.
Undoubtedly, managing those the bruised egos will be a significant headache for the Labour whips, in addition to managing the expectations of their very large majority, many of whom may be rather unrealistic about their own prospects of achieving ministerial office any time soon.
I suspect that the Government whips office will do what they did with their large majority in 1997. They simply won’t need them all to get their business through the Commons. So, they will be able to run shifts, allowing many to spend more time in their constituencies building up a reputation for being helpful, rather than plotting, airing grievances and frustrations in the Members’ Tea Room.
As to how it will all turn out, its far too soon to tell.