Skipper

The situation regarding the Deputy Leadership reminds me a little of Hugh Trevor Roper's Last Days of Hitler. As the Furhrer imploded manically in his bunker, his acolytes metaphorically scampered around, seeking to assume his mantle once he had gone. Tony Blair, also in the bunker is surrounded by acolytes who also think his shrivelled inheritance is worth fighting over. 'Ah,' you say, 'but this is only for the deputy's job' to which I would reply 'Ah, but don't be deceived, some of these candidates are in reality after the top job'. For example Alan Johnson. And to his candidacy we now have added, it would seem, those of Peter Hain, Jack Straw and even a possibility, I read in a Sunday with disbelief, Tessa Jowell. But perhaps the most interesting is Harriet Harman(pictured) in that she is, no prizes for this, a woman.

Harriet Harman had a slightly uneven early career. Appointed Social Services Secretary she was damaged by the single mother benefit row in the autumn of 1997. Moreover, critics did not feel she had shown any real flair in the job, had rowed a bit too openly with Frank Field and it was not surprising that she was sacked in the first reshuffle. But unlike many, or even most, sacked ministers- and there is a goodly crowd of them now- she busied herself loyally with Maternity Rights and the Childcare Commission and was rewarded for her lack of bitterness with the post of Solitor General(she is a QC)in 2001 and then office in the Constitutional Affairs Department after May 2005. She has survived the hic-cup of her husband Jack Dromey blowing the whistle on the peerages for loans scandal a short while ago, apparently unscathed.

Women, we are told by psephologists and Jackie Ashley, are the key to winning elections now and Cameron has already stretched out a lead with them of the kind Blair had when he too was pirouetting on the national stage to seduce their support back in 1997. Add to this the fact that Gordon is too Scottish, dour and unsmiley to charm middle class Daily Mail reading mums and the logic of choosing Mrs Dromey becomes apparent. She has come up with another reason, which she maybe thinks is a clincher: she is suggesting there should be two deputies, a male and a female one. This might appeal to the substantial female cohort in the PLP as an extra bauble for them and as a safeguard against another sleazy old git like Prezza getting the job. But I have two points to make on this suggestion. First, is it all that sensible to invent another job which most insiders say is pretty useless? Secondly, wouldn't the party's constitution have to be amended for such a post to be contested anyway?