I had my flu jab yesterday. Not covid related. And I have a cold. Also non-covid-related. What we used to call ‘a cold’. Just that now when you sneeze you clear the tube carriage. Win-win. And today I was invited for my covid booster. My stars are aligned. And my upper arms.

And just in time for the party conferences. Labour’s has just finished in Brighton and the conservatives will be having theirs. In Manchester? This weekend.

Kier Starmer gave his best impression of ‘a slightly more interesting person than he normally is’ during his rabble-raising, hour-and-a-half shout-a-thon yesterday. But he had to shout. Because of all the hecklers. The pro-Corbynites who constantly bemoan the direction the Labour Party is currently taking. Which, some might argue, is a few steps towards future electability. And a million miles from the last election result where the nation finally told Corbyn and his demonic acolytes precisely where he could shove his particularly nasty brand of neo-socialistic bollocks.

But Corbyn was ‘there’. In some kind of blackened ‘spirit’ presence. He occupied a few dirty pub back rooms to meet with his faithful and hear them sing his name. Amen. Tosser. The group looked like they’d never had a bath, let alone a vaccination. And in those meetings they denounced the Tories as ‘scum’ and they praised Lenin and Marx and the ghost of Len McLusky. And they carried on their particularly poisonous brand of persecution, separating themselves from anything currently considered ‘Labour party’ by half a dozen steps to the left.

Interestingly, party leaders consistently look less than totally comfortable making their ‘leadership speech’. Because its not what you say (or in Ed Milliband’s case, what he never chose to mention), but the way that you say it that requires you to leave your ‘leader-of-the-pack’ normal persona and become part stand-up, part cheerleader, part (in Milliband’s case) dickhead and main motivator. And it didn’t sit well on Sir Kier’s shoulders. But credit to him, he gave his all. More than he has in the last year of his tenure.

Happy Thursday

A xxx