A doe-eyed Andy Burnham has appeared looking sad across media outlets, hurt that he has been politically outmanoeuvred by Sir Keir Starmer. Burnham has positioned himself both as the wronged victim of Starmer’s Stalinist instincts and the only hope for a foundering party to find its popularity again. A cross between Bonnie Prince Charlie and Bambi’s Mother.

‘To decide is to divide’, Mr Alexander said. We were in deep Blairite doublespeak territory now

Appropriately, for what seems to resemble a community theatre production of Macbeth, the government wheeled out a Scottish MP for the media round. Clearly Douglas Alexander – a veteran of past Labour administrations where there were fifteen demonstrations of interpersonal psychopathy before breakfast – had been briefed to be as slippery as a lubed-up eel on an ice rink.

On Sky........

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