Guido hears cash-starved CCHQ is going to take quite some time to furnish its newly-appointed Shadow Ministers with personal advisers. One Shadow Cabinet Minister tells Guido: “They’ve got to sort the money first.” The hope is that in six weeks to two months the Tories should find enough behind the sofa to hire some help…
The majority of previous Tory SpAds have of course alighted to the private sector. A Shadow Cabinet source says everyone is relying on CCHQ and CRD to help with briefs. In the meantime the Shadow Chancellor is writing his own parliamentary questions…
Gudio hears that hilariously some Shadow Ministers are planning on fundraising for cash to hire their own advisers. Labour would often complain in opposition that it didn’t have enough resources for their many PAds. The Tories would give an arm for that problem…
Speaking on Times Radio, former Home Secretary David Blunkett spoke about overdiagnosis of mental problems:
“Let’s distinguish those who are really severely mentally ill, diagnosed with things that require prolonged medical and diagnostic treatment. My wife and I talk about this a lot, because she’s a retired GP, about the fact that you can be sad without being ill. You can be momentarily depressed because your boyfriend or girlfriend’s just thrown you and you’re not mentally ill. You can even have mild issues, which can be dealt with with the right kind of support, but it doesn’t make you mentally ill. So we’ve got a real task, I think, to get the psychology, if you like, of this over. But there are things where you definitely need medical intervention, and there are other things where you need good friends, you need good connectivity, and you need a job.”