Labour catastrophe bulletin: Looming purge, Eddie Izzard Death Star canteen, Billy Bragg, and more

Yesterday, at the urging of my friend Fiona Laird, I undertook to provide a round-up of the latest Labour catastrophe news, so that all the bad news could be stored in one place. People are finding that angry exchanges about the Labour party are ruining Twitter. Why not group it all into a Labour catastrophe bulletin whenever there is enough bad news about the far left’s destruction of one of the UK’s historic parties? The intention had been to provide this service on Reaction sparingly, only when it was needed, but there is just so much going wrong for the Labour party that I feel compelled to provide another update.

1. Get ready for the purge. Revolutionaries love a good old-fashioned cleansing civil war in which they banish their enemies. Stephen Bush of the New Statesman has published a terrific account of what is looming at Labour HQ now that the Corbynites have control, thanks to their clean sweep of the NEC (National Executive Committee) elections. The respected general secretary Iain McNicol look set to “get his jotters” as they used to say in Scotland, and other sensible staff are expecting to be removed too.

2. Death Star canteen: The defeat of the moderates on the NEC was the fault of the comedian Eddie Izzard, who is famous for constructing a routine in which Darth Vader, the baddie in Star Wars, the space adventure franchise now owned by Disney (let’s hope they don’t ruin it by commercialising Star Wars). Anyway, Izzard’s Vader goes for lunch in the canteen on the Death Star, which is the… oh never mind. Guido Fawkes has the latest.

3. On the back of Labour deputy leader Tom Watson denouncing Corbynite Trotsykist entryism (stay awake at the back) the BBC Radio 4 Today programme carried an interesting if bizarre discussion featuring the musician Billy Bragg and another chap, who denied that the Corbynite movement is a far left front infiltrating the Labour party. Alex Callinicos was billed as Professor of Political Theory, at King’s College London, although sadly there was no room to mention that he is the intellectual guiding force in the far left Socialist Workers Party (SWP).

4. Britain’s largest and most annoying trade union, Unite, which is run by that dreadful man Len McCluskey, has endorsed Corbyn, which is not a surprise. There was no ballot of the members, it is reported, because there was no need. The leadership know what the members want and what is in their best interests. Asking them would merely divert time, energy and resources from the struggle. The GMB union did hold a vote and has endorsed Owen Smith, which is good news if you are a Labour moderate, relatively speaking, and if you like that sort of thing. That does not alter the reality that the situation is so dire even Smith has to promise a programme of Socialist revolution to stand a chance with the new far left members.

5. All the Conservatives I meet seem to be very happy right now.

That was today’s Labour catastrophe news.