I admit some people did not like what I wrote about Dan Jarvis yesterday. Most were on Twitter. Most misread or seeingly misunderstood what I wrote, wilfully or otherwise.
I stand by what I wrote. Dan Jarvis said he wanted to tackle inequality. So do I. But he only listed some minor tinkering with corporation tax rules and a national infrastructure committee to spend an unspecified sum supposedly free of political interference as the basis for delivering this goal that will supposedly be supplied by better trained people, although how this latter objective was to be achieved was less than clear. I criticised because the 'plan' did not stack for me. Frankly, it hardly seemed to justify that description, let alone that of a vision, as it was described by some in the press.
I admit was slightly surprised to find that my comments dominate the front page of the Morning Star today.
I was less surprised to find some in the media agree with me. As Sebastian Payne says in the FT this morning:
There has been no public proof that Mr Jarvis could be the saviour of the party. If I were to grade his speech, it would be a B-, since it hit the bar of being a solid decently delivered speech. But it did not offer a particularly inspiring alternative to Mr Corbyn's agenda nor a platform for disgruntled MPs to rally behind.
You could argue that since no coup is on the horizon this does not matter. But based on this address, a Jarvis leadership would be nothing better than continuity Ed Miliband. If Mr Jarvis wants to be Labour's election-winning leader, he will have to up his game significantly.
That was the point. It's an uncomfortable fact for some that critical analysis is a necessary part of any process of change and as political economy goes, Dan Jarvis' speech fell short of the mark.
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Richard
You are not allowed to criticise Jarvis because he is obviously Blue Labour’s big hope of unseating Corbyn. They are desperate.
It’s rather pathetic to be honest. When you consider that there are so many lies told and that need putting straight about Labour’s time in office up to 2010 they should find the time to try to shout you down instead about the glaring holes in Jarvis’ ‘vision’ that you identified so well.
My only point of difference with you is that I do not see a new Milliband here (whose biggest weakness was trying to please all the factions in his party to the point where you could not work out what he was about).
Instead, Jarvis’ speech is redolent of Anthony Giddens’ influence on Tony Blair – we see this sort of stuff in Steve Hiltons’ guff as well – it all sounds terribly aware and conscientious, all for the under dog etc., but what it really represents is a brief moment in time when they have reflected on things as they continue their money grabbing rise to the top.
If it was not so pathetic it would be laughable. People leaping in without engaging brain trying to prove Jarvis’s comment about ordinary people not being capable of understanding or even thinking about these issues or processes in case it hurts their head.
This approach is yet another variation of the failed narrative of the Islington political commentariat that us ordinary people are just too wee, too poor and too stupid to think for ourselves – the approach that has gone tits up in Scotland and continues to do so – that says we need people like Dan The Man to strut about all macho like a roughie toughie super trooper telling us what to do, not to to worry our little heads and to stand in the corner of the barrack room with our thumbs up us bums and brains in neutral.
The political tennyboppers getting their shreddies in a twist on twitter might not be able to handle the scientific method of assessing evidence, preferring instead to parrot the empty vessel rhetoric of the Progress cult, but they really are kidding themselves if they think anyone would listen to such an uninspiring pile of twaddle based on a patronising pat on the head telling the rest of us that we are, like them, too dumb to understand.