Labour’s noise problem

Political parties rarely have good summers. If you’re in government, something normally goes wrong just as you’re settling into a deckchair. If you’re in Opposition, a good summer is when something has gone wrong in the government. A disappointing summer is when no-one notices your carefully-planned announcements. A bad summer is when you get plenty of attention, but for all the wrong reasons.

Labour has had a bad summer. It has spent much of it making rather wan attempts to calm the row on anti-semitism. A handy diversion turned up this week in the form of Dawn Butler taking exception to Jamie Oliver’s jerk rice, which has led to a row about cultural appropriation – as well as the Labour frontbencher clarifying, somewhat hilariously, that ‘I didn’t attack his chicken’.

As it happens, Butler didn’t attack his chicken, and her complaint about cultural appropriation does have more in it than some of her critics who are talking about Chicken Tikka Masala and carbonara with cream will allow.