Iain McNicol’s departure from the position of Labour General Secretary has been a very long time coming indeed. He wasn’t Ed Miliband’s first choice for the job, and he certainly wasn’t Jeremy Corbyn’s favourite person at Labour headquarters, either. After the snap election, Corbynites pushed for a ‘purge’ that involved ousting McNicol. They failed, then, but today he announced that he was off to ‘pursue new projects’, which is one of those Westminster formulae for ‘booted out’. Corbynite Jennie Formby is being mooted as his successor.
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In a sense, it’s admirable that McNicol managed to stay on for so long, given the constant attempts to get rid of him. Insiders say that Labour HQ had been subtly reorganised around him, and that the power behind the throne in the Southside building was in fact Executive Director Emilie Oldknow.
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