Following Labour’s smear attempt flop in the New Statesman earlier today, Guido noted how Labour may be learning from the New Labour policy playbook, though they are still a long way from running a competent political briefings operation. By total coincidence, Guido now spots the party has just put up a job ad for a £68,000-a-year “Director of Attack and Rebuttal”. Is Mandelson up to much?

According to the job ad, which also specifies an annual fixed sum allowance of £2,608, the role will involve being:

“responsible for the production and dissemination of materials to support Labour’s election strategy.

The successful candidate will have excellent news judgement, excellent knowledge and understanding of the current political situation, experience of producing content for news stories and successful experience of delivering high quality and accurate written products.”

Starmer actually told the Observer of his plans to create such a role way back in February 2020, begging the question of why it’s taken so long to organise. Should the successful applicant need some tips, they can always get in touch…