A co-conspirator forwarded this email sent to Massoud Fouladi, the Chief Medical Officer and co-founder of the Circle partnership which is taking over the running of a failing NHS hospital.

Labour leaning blogs and activists are up in arms about the invitation to the Circle Partnership to come in and run Hinchingbrooke Hospital. They seem to forget that it was Labour’s now Shadow Health Secretary Andy Burnham who started the Hinchingbrooke process. The decision to proceed with the franchise was one of his first acts as Health Secretary. Circle has already done some £110 million of NHS business under the last Labour Government. Labour’s Liz Kendall told the commons today: “Patients and the public will be deeply worried that this morning they have seen this Government’s true vision for the future of our NHS”. Ironically Andy Burnham, who started the whole process, was nowhere to be seen today,…

It seems that Kate Green apologising to the House yesterday for not declaring her financial interests, despite putting down amendments to legislation on behalf of unions, may shape up to be a massive tactical error for Labour. There is no excuse them not to apologise now every-time they are caught red-handed…

Quick off the mark the Tories are scouring every outlet for evidence of Trade Union influence on legislation, and it didn’t take them long to find Labour’s rising star Rachel Reeves doing the dirty:

“A leaked internal Labour document shows that the trade unions put pressure on Rachel Reeves, then Shadow Pensions Minister, to amend the Pensions Bill. Rachel Reeves election campaign received £3,000 in donations from Unite the union – one of the trade unions putting pressure on her to make amendments to the Bill.”

Warsi has written to Miliband to complain, but Guido’s not going to  hold his breath for her letter being filed anywhere other than the bin. When will Reeves apologise to the House, or were they just making an example of Kate Green?

For the last few months Guido has been the only one to point at Tom Watson’s new emperor outfit and laugh. Because of his new role as crusher of the press, the papers didn’t report his taxpayer funded PR adviser, nor his hypocrisy on spending, nor his late night antics at this year’s Labour conference. They’re not going to mention the real reason Tom was being watched by the tabloids in Brighton 2009 either…

However, Watson’s reputation took a knock today and the pack dared to criticise the bully for his over the top “mafia” attacks. Sky’s Sophy Ridge tweets that he just refused to do an interview with them because someone, somewhere on Sky News has quoted this blog. Apparently that makes “trivial television”. Not a great day for Tom to call others trivial… 

Guido will have something to say about Watson when he gives evidence to the Joint Committee on Privacy and Injunctions next week. Something tells him that Tommy won’t be repeating that he thinks the blog is “legendary“:

[vodpod id=Groupvideo.4133482&w=480&h=300&fv=%26rel%3D0%26border%3D0%26]

There’s no shortage of ammunition…

Via Crash Bang Wallace

Tom Watson lets the truth slip at the CMS Select Committee:

“This is about me, chair.”

Tom Watson created some drama at James Murdoch’s Select Committee appearence with the revelation, clearly not even briefed to the other members of the committee, that he’d met with Neville Thurlbeck. The former Screws Chief Reporter allegedly told Watson that the paper’s legal man Tom Crone had shown James Murdoch the email he denies he ever saw. Watson should have quit while he was ahead…

https://twitter.com/#!/HenryDeedes/status/134599469374259200

Instead his “you must be first mafia boss in history who didn’t know he was running a criminal enterprise” triggered groans from his fellow MPs.   The Guardian’s media man Dan Sabbagh wasn’t impressed: “Watson really blew it at the end with over the top questioning pushing the mafia line.“ His Media Guardian Deputy Editor called it “OTT”, ITV said “Watson fails to land a blow on Murdoch, so resorts to insults…and makes himself look ridiculous.” It’s as if he could hear the movie soundtrack in his head…