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Labour’s summer of hubristic books

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Tomorrow Gordon Brown is set to release his latest messianic tome. Grandly titled Seven Ways to Change the World: How to Fix the Most Pressing Issues We Face – presumably from some of the problems he first caused – it is set to be released exactly one week after his successor Ed Miliband published a rival guide: Go Big: How to Fix our World . Mr S wonders whether actually winning an election could be the answer to any of these questions?

Other Labour books out include the ironically titled The Dignity of Labour by Jon Cruddas and Jess Phillips’s Everything You Really Need to Know About Politics – a surprising title for a candidate who had to withdraw last year from the Labour leadership race after 18 days owing to a lack of support. The never knowingly undersold shadow minister has promised a ‘no-nonsense, highly entertaining manual’ in which she ‘will explain the process of running for government’ – a process incidentally Phillips herself has tried and failed three times.

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Steerpike

Steerpike is The Spectator's gossip columnist, serving up the latest tittle tattle from Westminster and beyond. Email tips to steerpike@spectator.co.uk or message @MrSteerpike

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