One of the rare Corbynistas still standing in Starmer’s Labour, North of Tyne mayor Jamie Driscoll, has quit the party. The now-independent mayor says he was given “no other choice” than to resign after he was barred from standing by party HQ and is promising to govern as a “common sense” voice for the people of Newcastle, North Tyneside and Northumberland. In a scathing letter to Keir Starmer, Driscoll says the Labour Leader has “U-turned on so many policies” and is guilty of “mental gymnastics worthy of gold”.
Jamie’s decision doesn’t come lightly – Guido reported he was planning the move last week – and his revolution won’t be cheap. Before he commits to standing for re-election, he wants to ring round his supporters for £25,000 by August. The self-confessed socialist will then target £150,000 for the full campaign…
Co-conspirators can read Jamie’s letter in full below:
Since becoming Labour leader, Keir and his Starmtroopers have reasserted control over the party machinery – with Comrade Corbyn and Dianne Abbott the first to be purged. And one man, North of Tyne’s momentum mayor Jamie Driscoll, is determined to take a stand. ¡Viva la Revolución!
Jamie was barred from standing as a candidate back in June for the egregious crime of standing alongside film-maker Ken Loach, however he has made clear he’s not going to let himself be “controlled by Party HQ”. Speaking on Saturday at a “Grassroots Update“ event in Newcastle, Driscoll weighed up his options. After outlining the excessive costs of challenging the party internally, he hinted at an independent run. Nomination papers aren’t due until next March…
Jamie also alluded to the inspiration behind his revolutionary streak. Speaking to his adoring audience, he said:
“There was a time when Che Guevara, who was in the jungle with a few dozen other people, that led to actually taking power to make somewhere more egalitarian… you are the people.”
‘Bicycle diaries’ doesn’t quite have the same ring to it…
In October 2022, Guido secured the suspension of Labour councillor Theresa Norton, who had just been arrested for the fourth time as part of Just Stop Oil’s climate protests. Until Guido challenged the Labour press office, it looked like they were going to let her carry on, despite Sir Keir’s strong opposition to the disruptive demonstrations…
It’s now emerged, however, that Councillor Norton has decided to jump before she was pushed. While having the whip suspended during the investigation into her actions, she now tells her local paper that she’s made the decision to leave the party anyway because it’s not socialist enough for her.
“They asked me to qualify my actions.
“But rather than wait until January or February for them to make the decision, I chose to leave the party.
“As a socialist, I find that I needed something a bit more than what the Labour Party nationally are offering at the moment.
“I’m a true socialist and they’re not quite living up to my expectations of how a socialist government should perform.
Unfortunately, Scarborough Council is to be abolished in April of next year, so we won’t get to see how Norton’s extremist pro-crime politics would have fared at the ballot box. Just Stop Oil and their Extinction Rebellion comrades do seem rather allergic to democracy…
As SW1 and the media spin themselves into an immigration-fuelled frenzy, there is at least one inevitable outcome – lefty activists making performative protests.
Guido’s attention was drawn to one stunt, whereby protesters affixed a sign to a government building in Manston. They dubbed it the “Centre of Cruelty for Refugees”. The government building in question: a car park attendant’s office…
The protest, organised by Freedom from Torture, was essentially paid for by British taxpayers.
For funding, it counts the Ministry of Justice, The National Lottery Community Fund, Manchester and Newcastle City Councils and the Scottish Government Equalities and Social Cohesion Fund amongst its benefactors. With their funding, the group is really putting the public into publicity stunt.
This isn’t Freedom from Torture’s first example of questionably political activism, the group also boasts of a “campaign win” in making sure “no plane ever takes off to Rwanda”. They also, of course, count Jeremy Corbyn as a “long time supporter”.
Whether it contravenes government guidance will be a matter of argument. As a charity, it is entitled to a generous range of tax breaks. But with that comes obligations:
…political campaigning, or political activity … must be undertaken by a charity only in the context of supporting the delivery of its charitable purposes. Unlike other forms of campaigning, it must not be the continuing and sole activity of the charity.
Leaving that to the lawyers, the obvious question remains: why is the government funding groups that frustrate its own agenda?
Good times were had by all at the Wansbeck Constituency Labour Party dinner on Friday. The all-star lineup included local MP Ian Lavery, his parliamentary colleagues Graeme Morris and Kate Osborne, Mick Lynch, and Labour’s North of Tyne Mayor Jamie Driscoll. All raising their glasses to champagne socialism.
It must have been awkward for Jamie Driscoll, though. He happened to share a table with ex-Labour members expelled for links to proscribed communist group Socialist Action, including Holly Waddell and his former campaign chief Tony Pierre. Presumably Driscoll made amends with Pierre after airbrushing him from history on social media…
Breaking bread with suspended socialists? People have been kicked off Labour’s candidates’ list for less in the last few weeks…
Hard-left Corbyn fan girl MP Nadia Whittome was condemned by Wes Streeting on Newsnight last night for a tweet she posted after Rishi Sunak was confirmed as the new Tory leader and PM-designate. Whittome explained to her followers that Rishi is effectively so rich he is no longer Asian in the eyes of the left.
Streeting told Newsnight, “I think she’s done the right thing and deleted it… I think that’s a matter for Keir and I’m sure it’s no coincidence the tweet’s been deleted.”
“I’ll put it this way: there are children in my constituency this evening who turned on the news to see someone who looked like them about to become our country’s Prime Minister. I think that’s a wonderful thing.”
Angela Rayner also told PA “I think it’s really important actually today to see our politicians, I’ve said this many times as a working class girl with an accent from Manchester, for our politicians to represent and for people to see themselves within our senior politicians.”
Labour officials gave Nadia a stern word and told her to delete the tweet, rather than realising of her own volition it was a bad look. She’s yet to apologise. For the hard left, anti-racism only applies to fellow comrades…
