In her Guardian column, Jackie Ashley writes:
I would hazard a guess that this might be the same meeting that Kevin Maguire described as follows in the New Statesman back in December:“[McBride] was regarded as the heart of a Brownite shadow operation, based around a Wednesday afternoon meeting of just five or six people, which spent far too much energy plotting against ministers.”
We know that two people who attended this meeting definitely knew about the plans for Red Rag and another attendee is mentioned in the emails discussing it.“The great guessing game over the date of the election has overlooked a regular gathering in No 10 on Wednesday afternoons. Chaired by Gordon Brown’s mini-me, Ed Balls, the eclectic collective includes Miss Moneypenny Sue Nye, the spinner Damian McBride, the union money man Charlie Whelan, Colin Byrne (corporate link), the fixer Tom Watson and Labour’s generalissimo Ray Collins, plus an assortment of other influential figures.”
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