So McSweeney is permitted to resign ‘from government’ and in his apology seeks to constrain his downfall to his support for Mandelson as US ambassador. His departure gives Labour the opportunity to find its heart again as McSweeney did so much to remove it, building a party that as Martin Forde predicted, in his inquiry report, where factional loyalty counted for more than public service.
Clive Lewis writes on Facebook, saying, among other things,
… That mindset hollowed Labour out. It replaced a party rooted in working-class life with a professional political caste fluent in donor networks, private dinners and elite reassurance, while communities were told to accept decline as the price of ‘responsible’ government. Politics became about managing optics and markets, not challenging vested interests or redistributing power.
McSweeney’s departure changes none of that on its own. Unless Labour confronts the culture that rewarded closeness to wealth, blurred ethical lines and treated democratic accountability as an inconvenience, this will amount to little more than damage limitation.
Remove one operator and the system that produced him remains. And unless that system is dismantled, Labour will continue to lose its moral authority, its social base, and ultimately its right to govern, leaving the ground clear for forces far worse to exploit the wreckage.
The whole piece is worth reading.
I agree with Clive, this is an opportunity, one that was always coming, to turn the government and the Party round. The Party bureaucracy and elements of the PLP need clearing out, without it, my Party’s future looks very dim.
Richard Burgon, also says, that this is only a necessary first step.