MPs are often fond of complaining that they are ignored by senior figures in their parties as orders are passed on from central HQ with no explanation or opportunity for backbenchers to discuss strategy. Yesterday’s mess over Labour’s internal memo advising MPs on tackling Ukip partly explains why that high-handed approach often happens.
Emailing strategy documents to MPs is like leaving a toddler in a freshly painted room with a set of marker pens and expecting to come back to find everything in pristine condition. There is a reason why such papers should be numbered, handed out in a locked room for discussion and collected at the end, if you don’t do that they will end up in a national paper (and even those precautions may not be enough). But if that mistake was somewhat naïve, the party’s handling of the fallout has been utterly baffling.
Ed Miliband’s response to being asked about the paper — which offers perfectly sensible advice on how to move the immigration debate onto territory more likely to persuade someone to support Labour — has been to deny all knowledge of it, claim it was badly written and say that it doesn’t represent the party’s views.
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