http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2015/aug/17/labour-leadership-andy-burnham-yvette-cooper-contest
Andy Burnham and Yvette Cooper trade blows as leadership contest intensifies
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Andy Burnham offers Jeremy Corbyn “a
job”, in his Shadow Cabinet and presumably any government cabinet
which Burnham may form at sometime in the future. A remarkably
magnanimous gesture from a man who claims never to have voted against
the party whip in the House of Commons, a man who has consistently
advocated further austerity for the UK economy, has frequently
demonstrated an ability for evasion, particularly during Ian Dale's
LBC Radio programme and along with all but 48 members of the
Parliamentary Labour Party, abstained on the vote on the Conservative
Welfare Bill last July. Burnham qualifies this offer however, with an
appeal for Labour party members who intend to vote for Corbyn in the
leadership election, to move over to the Burnham camp to prevent
Kendall or Cooper emerging as the winner.
This “offer” of course make two
very sweeping assumptions. Namely that (a), Burnham will actually win
the Leadership election and consequently be in a position to offer
anyone a place in his Shadow Cabinet and (b) that he would actually
win a General election at sometime in the future.
Perhaps the observer could be excused
for thinking that the member for Leigh is optimistic, naïve, a
little arrogant or even a mixture of all three.
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The “offer” to Jeremy Corbyn has
widened and made very public, the split between Burnham and Cooper
which has been festering away from public scrutiny for some weeks.
The “Anyone but Corbyn” campaign has always had a fundamental
problem, in that there are three candidates, all from the “right”
of the party, proposing the same old status quo policies and all
competing for the same voting support base. The only thing that
unites the three is their fear and dislike for Corbyn.
With Cooper now publicly calling for
Burnham to stand down from the leadership contest the divisions
between her and Burnham and in the background Kendall, have shifted
the debate away from the real issues and created a slanging match
between three candidates, intent on promoting themselves as the only
alternative. In standing away from this spectacle Jeremy Corby
maintains his position of putting forward proposals and policies and
refusing to become involved in the puerile activity of name calling
and personal attacks.
This current hostility between Burnham,
Cooper and Kendall, raises a pertinent
question. If the only word
they have to offer, the only appeal that they can present to Labour
party members, the only
message that they can offer to people around the country, is that
only one of them is the person that can beat Jeremy Corbyn, then why
should anyone trust in them to address or even understand, the real
issues and problems which face this country today?
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Homelessness,
growing use of foodbanks, problems within the NHS, Welfare Cuts,
austerity, education, banks, anti trade union legislation and a
hundred other issues are the real priorities and it is only Jeremy
Corbyn who is addressing these problems.
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