The real battle for Labour’s soul

This summer’s election to choose a new deputy regional sales manager of the Co-op, sorry, a new leader of the Labour party, has rather obviously failed to set the nation on fire. But one level below the sundry Eds and assorted Milibands, there’s a much clearer and more interesting battle for Labour’s soul.

In the party’s highest-membership region, London, the graphic designers and diversity outreach consultants who make up Labour’s new industrial base are choosing a mayoral candidate to oppose Boris Johnson in 2012. Officially, the odd timing — nominations closed only six weeks after the general election, and almost two years before polling day — is to allow the successful nominee to ‘establish their presence’ with the London electorate. In practice, it seems designed to benefit someone whose presence with the London electorate is all too balefully established: the former mayor, Ken Livingstone.

By not allowing enough time for various ex-ministerial or MP candidates to get campaigns together, the theory seems to have been that Ken would have a clear run at correcting the grave error made by the voters in 2008.