Monday, April 13, 2009

LabourHome: Prescott Calls for Draper's Head


Charles Clarke got rid of McBride. Now it's Prescott's turn to stick the knife into Draper. Labour Home has the exclusive with Prescott's comments.
Frankly I am very disappointed by this turn of events. I've always believed as a Labour activist that we should campaign on the issues and the politics. But smear campaigns - be they in the newspapers or on the internet - are fundamentally wrong and only help to poison the political debate.

I understand one man has left his job at No10 - and quite rightly so.
I believe Derek Draper should now follow him too. He is not a paid official or even employed by the Labour Party and was just a voluntary adviser on new media. But I'm sure that that the General Secretary will and should make clear that such advice is totally unacceptable and not wanted.

We've shown in the last few months that Labour can have a coherent voice on the internet with many left-wing bloggers putting the case and building campaigns, like our successful one against bankers bonuses.

But this should not be done at the expense of integrity or decency, which were clearly breached in this matter.

It only needs one other senior Labour figure to follow Prescott's lead and he's toast.

Graphic hattip: Lakelander's View

16 comments:

strapworld said...

I find the silence of Mandleson quite, quite, significant!

Catosays said...

I expect Mandy's somewhere erotic....ooops meant exotic.

Windsor Tripehound said...

I'm more surprised that Alan Johnson has allowed himself to be dragged into this.

Does anybody out there know why?

neil craig said...

If he is not paid or employed by Labour who does that chore. Or is he independently wealthy, like Bertie Wooster without the manners.

Oldrightie said...

Prezza takes the moral high ground. Now that is funny. We'll have Kinnock playing the role Wesley next!

Anonymous said...

You know you're in trouble when John Prescott starts lecturing you about morals.

Wrinkled Weasel said...

It is obvious to anybody with a brain that Labour list was covertly funded by the Labour Party at the instigation of number 10.

Draper claims it is funded by Unite, a powerful union with a fat cat leadership. Unite openly funds the Labour Party.

So can anybody explain the difference between funding a number 10 attack blog and funding Labour directly?

Thought not.

It's all to do with plausible deniability, something they seem to be good at in Downing Street.

All it needs is another whistleblower.

Unknown said...

Drapers now caught between a rock and a hard place.

He's not employed by anyone, so he can't be fired, but i'll be surprised if any more Labour MP's return his phone calls, let alone write any more articles for LabourList.

So he can continue with LabourList, but it will be embarrassing. Cut loose from Labour, it will become a void for people like Shamik Das to fill with their dry uninteresting articles. Comments will be low, and even then a mixture of trolls and a few Labour apologists.

That's beneath even him to be honest. So he has to resign, but that will be an admission of guilt in itself, but I see no other alternative?

I think there is no good choice for him, but the best of the bad seems to be to resign from LabourList, turn his back on politics, and get back to being a psychotherapist. He could even make some money by selling his story of his recent downfall to OK magazine or something?

Either way, I expect him to largely disappear.

Bye bye Dolly, thanks for the laughs!

Mirtha Tidville said...

hopefully he`ll disappear into the cocktail party circuit and become plain Mr Garraway.....mind you he`d have to smarten himself up first...

I bet the reason Lord Rumba is keeping his head down is because he`s frightened some trail might lead back to his door...Imagine what might happen if Guido could prove that one eh....

IanVisits said...

It feels quite bizarre, but I am starting to build up quite a bit of respect for John Prescott.

Unsworth said...

Prescott could hardly support Draper. He has/had no alternative but to condemn him. Of course and as always, he's jumping on whatever bandwagon he can. Prescott just cannot resist getting his name in the papers. Mandelson by contrast chooses a little more carefully.

Jimmy said...

Yes it is disturbing how little attention the Government is devoting to internet handbag fights.

The Grim Reaper said...

I don't like that picture one bit. Toast is something warm and tasty that can be eaten at anytime of the day. Draper is something cold and pointless that you wouldn't want to be within a million miles of.

Anonymous said...

Grim Reaper:

It just popped out of my toaster this morning and I thought:

(a) It looks like Derek Draper

(b) It must be some sort of message

(c) How much did that idiot pay for the Image-of-the-Virgin-Mary-on-a-piece-of-toast that was sold on Ebay?

Dave H said...

Discredited bullying liar calls for head of discredited bullying liar.

Wonderful thing, British politics.

Martin S said...

Will Draper Resign? Probably not