COMMENT: Labour’s lucky break in race to the bottom
Just when the opposition’s conference looked like it was descending into mayhem, the Tories rode to the rescue – as has been the trend in recent years.
As the last strains of The Red Flag filled the air, the packed hall was a sea of smiles and raised fists.
Against all the odds, a fiery, provocative and utterly chaotic Labour conference had ended in triumph – but the victory had nothing to do with the party itself.
Not for the first time, Labour had been bailed out by the old enemy.
The Supreme Court’s damning ruling that Boris Johnson had misled the Queen to unlawfully shut down Parliament changed the narrative in an instant, allowing Jeremy Corbyn a victory that was not of his own making.
It was a most welcome piece of luck for the usually hapless Labour leader, who prefers to lead from the back while confusion swirls all around him.
Tory MPs who had spent days chuckling at Labour’s in-fighting and crackpot policies were now staring into the void, under strict orders from the whips office not to comment publicly until Number 10 could work out the party line on this latest debacle.
With the PM’s plans in tatters, grinning Remainer MPs scurried back to the Commons, eager to unleash the next stage of the plan to stop Brexit.
It was a remarkable turn of events, as up until Tuesday morning the Labour conference had been an exercise in misery.
There was the botched Momentum-led attempt to get rid of Tom Watson, a failed coup described as a “drive-by shooting” by the West Bromwich East MP – although he may want to reconsider his choice of words bearing in mind the furore over the language used by our parliamentarians.
It was the most blatant attempt yet by the hard-left to sideline the moderates’ main man, but one which resulted in his position being strengthened as many of his allies finally came out of the woodwork to back him.
A bitterly divided party?
Not us, said union motormouth Len McCluskey, who managed to keep a straight face when he accused the media of trying to create division where none existed.
Then there were a whole host of bonkers policies agreed by members that were either undeliverable or just plain daft.
Let’s get rid of private schools, they cried, presumably meaning Jeremy Corbyn wants to shut down Adams’ Grammar, the school he attended in the 1960s.
There was a pledge to slash greenhouse gas emissions to “net zero” by 2030 – two decades before any other nation. The target is impossible to achieve, unions warned, although Labour could cripple the UK economy trying.
An eyebrow-raising new immigration policy was also unveiled, extending free movement and lifting barriers to migrants from all over the world.
There’s a fine line between the radical and the idiotic, and while the party’s 2017 manifesto was clearly a vote winner, this looked like the type of dated Socialist claptrap that will ensure Labour stays in opposition for years to come.
Naturally, Brexit was the main bone of contention at the conference.
Even by the low standards of the Corbyn era, it was jaw-dropping to see a vote on the single most important issue for the party’s future settled on a show of hands that to many onlookers appeared to be a pretty even split.
Chair Wendy Nichols thought it went one way, General Secretary Jennie Formby thought it went the other.
Delegates looked bemused, some shouting that the result was wrong and demanding a card vote.
It was like the University of Wolverhampton Students Union deciding whether to put the beer up 5p, rather than a decision that could potentially mean the difference between Labour winning or losing a general election.
In the end, the matter was resolved in the party leader’s favour with a rousing chorus of ‘Oh Jeremy Corbyn’, allowing Labour to maintain its non-committed position on Brexit.
But with one 20-minute bombshell court ruling, all the nonsense was forgotten and Mr Corbyn took to the podium like a conquering hero.
It is one of the remarkable things about the torrid battle between Labour and the Conservatives in recent years.
Whenever one party appears on the brink of implosion, the other comes riding its donkey over the horizon to the rescue.
It’s like clockwork. When the Tories were tearing themselves apart in the wake of the EU referendum, Labour responded by falling to pieces.
While Mr Johnson is losing vote after vote in the Commons, Labour steals the headlines with more allegations over anti-Semitism.
Make no mistake, Labour’s conference was as bad as bad can be.
But the intervention of the courts means that in the race to the bottom, the Tories have swerved in front.
Mr Johnson will be hoping for his own slice of good fortune when the Conservative conference hits Manchester tomorrow.
