Corbyn

It had to come. I've got a cold that's stopping me sleeping so I've been online and discovered what the press and TV channels are saying about the latest Labour Party fiasco. You know, the train thing. Where Jeremy Corbyn couldn't get a seat so he sat on the floor and complained about over-crowded trains but he did it on a Virgin train and Branson was not happy and decided to take him on. Result: CCTV pictures everywhere. None of them clear. That means accusation and counter-accusation.

I gave up on the Labour Party a few years back. Normally I try not to comment publicly on their activities but privately I've been asking friends who are still inside the organisation how things are going, and the answer is not well. Most are voting for Corbyn in the upcoming leadership election. A few have changed their view since seeing the train nonsense but say they may return to Corbyn when they are less angry.

To me it seems that the big problem for opponents of Corbyn is that Owen Smith is totally uninspiring. That leads me to ask: What happened? One minute, Labour was full of radical, intellectual, clever people like John Smith, Tony Blair, Gordon Brown, Tony Benn, Alan Johnson and Robin Cook. Even if you didn't like them, they were leaders. Next minute, the only person on offer was Owen Smith.

I'm not going to trot out the usual Tory line that we need 'a strong opposition' in Westminster. I have a mental picture of Tory ministers high-fiving each other as they say that, delighted at the chaos in Labour ranks. The SNP are doing a pretty good job of presenting an opposition on behalf of Scotland, despite getting no cooperation from Labour.

Maybe someone needs to say this and I'm happy to oblige: Everyone thought at the start of all this that Corbyn was useless, a far left candidate who would never be able to appeal to members and voters, and would be unable to defend himself in a fight. He has about 80% of the Westminster party against him. And he's had every type of sh$t thrown at him in the past year. But still he commands the support of the Labour membership - and he's still here.

Time to think about that.