The Londoner: Labour is run by ‘familial clique’

Labour head office hires wife of top figure/ Doris Day's early ambitions revealed/ Arizona Muse shares a tip/ Surprise Obama appearance at Nibbies​
'Close circle': Seumas Milne, Jeremy Corbyn’s strategy director, and Shadow Chancellor John McDonnell
Bloomberg via Getty Images
14 May 2019

Labour’s top tier has long battled accusations of nepotism — not least because Jeremy Corbyn’s son Seb works for shadow chancellor John McDonnell, John Prescott’s son David runs events for the leader’s office and Corbyn adviser Andrew Murray’s daughter Laura worked as “stakeholder manager” in the leader’s office.

Now Maryam Eslamdoust has been hired by Labour’s head office. Eslamdoust, a Camden councillor, is married to Labour’s head of compliance Thomas Gardiner. Both represent the Kilburn ward.

A senior Labour source says that there is “discomfort” over the number of close connections around the Labour leader.

“Laura Murray has now gone to be head of complaints* at the Labour Party and is reporting to the senior lawyer in the party, a man called Thomas Gardiner. It’s a small circle of trust. And that’s no different to the way Gordon Brown or Tony Blair ran their private offices, except nobody thought this leader would do it.”

This morning a source close to the leadership strongly refuted any suggestion of wrongdoing in the appointment of Eslamdoust, saying that she previously worked in the Leader of the Oppositions’ Office, her employment was unrelated to Gardiner’s, and that she won her new role after a competitive recruitment process.

Another “close” friendship that is the often remarked upon is the one between Karie Murphy, Corbyn’s chief of staff, and Len McCluskey, general secretary of Unite. A source who knows the leadership team well says: “Karie Murphy is very instinctive about who should work anywhere near the leader. She is very powerful — even more powerful than Seumas [Milne, Corbyn’s strategy director] .”

This morning Bridget Prentice, a former MP for Lewisham East, resigned from the Labour Party after 45 years as a member, citing in part Labour’s narrowness.

“The talk was of giving the party back to the membership,” Prentice wrote, “in fact it is run by a familial clique”.

A Day of destiny

Early days: Doris Day in 1962
Getty Images

American idol Doris Day, who died yesterday at the age of 97, starred in films including Pillow Talk and Calamity Jane, and released 29 studio albums. But her first ambition was to be a ballerina.

“Ballet was my favourite thing,” she wrote in a letter for the 2004 book Original Ambition by Dominic Shelmerdine. But an accident put paid to her dream.

“When I was involved in a train wreck as a teenager, my leg was severely broken in many places, and dancing was absolutely out of the question. That’s when I started singing. It showed me that what seemed to be a tragedy was eventually positive.”

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Labour aren’t having the greatest of European election campaigns. Jeremy Corbyn’s reported insistence yesterday that the party should focus on “local issues” was allegedly met with howls of outrage. Things got worse in Scotland where the Daily Record reported that a blunder meant leaflets delivered to homes in the Scottish Islands were written in Welsh.

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The Financial Times is settling back into its former HQ in Bracken House, though it seems there might be some teething problems with the catering. FT journalist Naomi Rovnick noticed yesterday that the canteen menu for today features “toad in the whole”.

Becoming moment at Nibbies ceremony

Slay: Elizabeth Uviebinené and Yomi Adegoke
Dave Benett/Getty Images

The British Book Awards — affectionately known as The Nibbies — were held last night at the Grosvenor House Hotel, hosted by Lauren Laverne. Guests included comedian David Baddiel, journalist Dolly Alderton and actor Ruth Jones, as well as BBC broadcaster Anita Anand. Slay in Your Lane authors Elizabeth Uviebinené and Yomi Adegoke also attended, as did the activist and podcast host Scarlett Curtis.

The highlight of the evening was a surprise video message from Michelle Obama, who won the Non-Fiction Award for her memoir, Becoming, which was presented by anti-Brexit campaigner Gina Miller. The former First Lady called the award “an incredible honour”.

Comedian David Walliams picked up the Children’s Fiction Book of the Year prize, while Sally Rooney’s Normal People beat Anna Burns and Jojo Moyes to Fiction Book of the Year.

Rooney also won the coveted Book of the Year award.

SW1A

In the running: Mark Harper
Corbis via Getty Images

Mark Harper MP, chief whip under David Cameron, warned colleagues jostling for the leadership last week that they risked making the party look “self-indulgent” ahead of the European elections. Now he has released a video of his vision for the future of the Conservative Party, made by the same company that produced campaign-style videos for Penny Mordaunt, Amber Rudd and Johnny Mercer in recent weeks. If you can’t beat ’em...

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The Dead Ringers cast share tips for nailing impressions of Tory leadership contenders. For Michael Gove, “start off with Ronnie Corbett and, like chlorine over an American chicken”, slide into “goblin”, Jon Culshaw tells Today. Jan Ravens adds that Andrea Leadsom is “like an extreme member of a Tupperware party”.

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Change UK and Corbynistas don’t exactly see eye to eye, so get ready for fun confusion as CHUK unveils MEP candidate Jon Owen Jones.

Quote of the Day

‘She is behaving towards Parliament just like Charles I’

Angela Eagle compares Theresa May to the unpopular king as Parliament reaches its longest session since the Civil War

Model for a caring, sharing future

Eco-warrior: Arizona Muse
Dave Benett/Getty Images

When it comes to saving the planet, model Arizona Muse says sharing is caring. Inspired by Michael Gove’s speech at the Step up to the Plate food waste campaign launch yesterday attended by charities including the Felix Project, she told The Londoner “the sharing economy is the way forward”.

“Work needs to be done to make sure the public doesn’t find rental dirty or less good than ownership,” she added.

“I get to borrow clothes all the time. I wear an amazing outfit I would never buy because it’s too expensive. I wear it to the event, then I get to give it back next day.”

*corrected for online edition

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