by Chris Mullin
This evening in the Tea Room Lynne Jones, who had consumed a glass or two of wine, talked loudly of finding someone to run against Gordon when the time comes (and it may do sooner rather than later). ‘What about you?’ she asked, ‘the only member of the government to vote against the war.’ Ann Clwyd, who was rather keen on the war, but with whom I am in sympathy on just about every other issue, was sitting with us. Behind sat Jim Murphy, our much-loved FCO whip, and I could see that he was earwigging.
‘Robin won’t run,’ said Lynne, ‘because he won’t want to be defeated. We need someone who’s prepared to risk humiliation …’ ‘Gee, thanks Lynne.’
Lynne may be a bit crass, and a headbanger to boot, but she has a serious point. Gordon ought not be given a free run. The trail for many of our difficulties – the rows over lone-parent benefit and the 75 pence pension increase, not to mention much of the ludicrous spinning that did so much to undermine our credibility in the early days – leads back to him. As for Iraq, he would have backed Bush. He is even more in love with America than The Man. At the very least there needs to be a contest and, if not Robin, Jack or Hilary – who?
Thursday, 7 April
My last night at Brixton Road, after 32 years. I looked around sadly before I closed the door for the last time. I’ve had some good times here.
My last official engagements in London before the election: I addressed a meeting in the Moses Room of the Lords to commemorate the anniversary of the Rwandan genocide. Then a cup of tea with Paul Boateng, who has given up his seat to become (assuming we win) our High Commissioner in South Africa. I had meant to clear my personal effects from my desk in the Foreign Office to spare the humiliation of having them handed over in a plastic bag, if I don’t come back, but there wasn’t time. Finally, to King’s Cross for the 20.00 train to the north. On Westminster tube station I overtook David Drew (Stroud, majority 5,000), also on his way home. He was trying to sound optimistic, but the odds are he won’t be coming back.* Thank goodness I’m in a safe seat. I couldn’t bear to be out of work in my fifties with two young children to support.
Saturday, 9 April
To the Stadium of Light to see Sunderland beaten 2–1 by Reading. If we get back into the Premiership – and it looks as though we might – we will be smashed out of sight.
Charles married Camilla this afternoon. The Queen looked remarkably cheerful as they emerged from St George’s Chapel. As one of the commentators remarked, no doubt she was thinking, ‘Thank Gawd that’s over.’
Sunday, 10 April
Belair Hotel, Luxembourg
My first – and perhaps last – Euro-outing. I am here for the meeting between the so-called EU-troika and representatives of the African Union. Bharat and I arrived this evening via Amsterdam. We were met at the steps of the aircraft by a young woman from Protocol and whisked away in a top-of-the-range silver Audi, preceded by three police motorcyclists with flashing lights and sirens, racing through red lights, all very pointless since the streets are largely deserted. One expects this sort of nonsense in Africa, where a vast gulf exists between the rulers and the ruled, but not in one of the most sophisticated parts of Europe.
Monday, 11 April
Luxembourg
Our silver Audi, complete with its trio of police motorcyclists, reappeared after breakfast and we set off for the conference centre, barging through rush hour traffic. Our police escorts behaved with Third World arrogance, waving their arms, shouting and generally throwing their weight around. All this for a mere parliamentary under-secretary. Ridiculous, embarrassing and positively dangerous (there were several near misses). One detects a certain resistance from the sturdy motorists of Luxembourg. Not everyone gets out of the way quickly enough and some seem wilfully to misinterpret the signals from our escort.
The meeting itself went off surprisingly well. I had been briefed to expect a fiasco, but it was nothing of the sort. The plenary was skil-fully chaired by the Deputy Prime Minister of Luxembourg, a charming, cheerful, charismatic former postman. Most of the talking on our side was done by the European commissioners for foreign affairs and international development, Xavier Solana and Louis Michel. I was allocated a walk-on part in the ‘governance’ section. On the African side most of the talking was done by the Nigerian Foreign Minister, Oluyemi Adeniji, and the African Union Peace and Security Commissioner (in charge of the Darfur mission), Said Djinnit. The communiqué was finalised over a lavish lunch. The Nigerians wanted to reopen just about everything previously agreed – especially the line on debt relief – but were firmly slapped down by the chairman. Sure enough, contrary to what had been agreed at the preliminary session, the draft contained no mention of Zimbabwe, but we managed to get this reinstated.
By 3 p.m. it was all over. I then had two long bilateral meetings with Djinnit and Adeniji and then we climbed into our silver Audi, raced back to our hotel, waved goodbye to our police escort and (as soon as they were out of sight) Bharat and I slipped out for a two-hour walk.
Tuesday, 12 April
Luxembourg
Lunch at the Residence, a magnificent 18th-century mansion precariously perched atop the deep gorge that runs through the centre of the city. We were supposed to be delivered back to the hotel in time to be collected by our police escort but, on my instructions, Bharat rang to cancel. ‘But that means you won’t be able to use the VIP lounge,’ said a mildly shocked voice at the other end of the line. ‘So?’
By evening I was back in Sunderland. The last couple of days have been spent, it seems, trying to prove that Gordon and The Man really love each other, which, as everyone knows, is nonsense. They were on the news this evening looking tense and exhausted; Howard, by contrast, looks as fresh as a daisy.
Wednesday, 13 April
Sunderland
I am reading Piers Morgan’s diaries which, although it pains me to say so, are riveting. Most astonishing is the degree of access he enjoyed. Morgan records: ‘Bored one evening, I counted up all the times I had met Tony Blair. And the result was astonishing really, or slightly shocking – according to your viewpoint. I had 22 lunches, six dinners, six interviews, 24 further one-to-one chats over tea and biscuits and numerous phone calls with him …’
He is forever being wined, dined and stroked by Alastair Campbell, Peter Mandelson and The Man. All to no avail since he turned on us big-time over Iraq. If they expended this much effort on the Mirror, one can only speculate as to the contortions they must have gone to keep the Sun sweet. Was it worthwhile? At the outset maybe, but once we had won I would have kept the ratpack at arm’s length, instead of continually trying to suck up to them. It got us nowhere in the end.
Friday, 15 April
The asylum poison is having an impact. Kevin and I called at the club in South Hylton last night in search of signatures for my nomination
papers and I could hear an oaf at the other end of the bar, married to a Labour Party member, muttering, ‘I’m not voting for multi-culturalism.’ It wasn’t until I saw Robert Kilroy-Silk on the news that I realised where he had acquired the phrase.
Saturday, 16 April
Shopping in Asda this morning I was accosted by a fiftyish male, hair tied back in a long blond-going-on-white ponytail. His tone was friendly: ‘Is Labour going to get back in again?’
‘I don’t know. What do you think?’
‘Why aye, you’ll walk it, man.’
‘I am not so sure.’
A minute later he was back. ‘Why aren’t you confident, like?’
‘Because it depends how many people bother to vote.’
‘Aye well, it’s all these foreigners coming in. Labour has slipped up a bit there.’
I pointed out that when Michael Howard was Home Secretary it took an average of 20 months to process a new application for asylum. Today it takes two. He looked sceptical and then changed tack: ‘And Blair, of course, is never here. He’s always over with his friend in America, lining up a job for when Brown takes over.’
> That apart, no one else so much as nodded in my direction. The silence is eerie.
Not the whole story, though. Roy the hairdresser, who employs half a dozen people, told me that a small business like his always did best under Labour and that he will be voting for us despite his disagreement over Iraq and despite having a son in the army who is likely to be sent there at any moment. And my solicitor said that he would be voting Labour (for the first time) because he had been impressed by Blair’s effort to win over the middle ground.
Tuesday, 19 April
The master strategists in the Ministerial Campaigning Unit at HQ dispatched me to Tynemouth, where Alan Campbell is defending a majority of 8,000, the nearest we have to a Labour-held marginal in the north-east. As I anticipated, it soon became clear that he didn’t have much use for me, but I hung around for a couple of hours. A photo was taken of Alan handing me a petition about Africa and away I went, having enabled someone somewhere to tick a box.
Alan was fairly upbeat. He said that the sheer nastiness of the Tory campaign has galvanised some of his otherwise inactive members to call in and offer their services.
Thursday, 21 April
A visit to the new community school at Valley Road. One of the proudest fruits of our education policy. It has everything a poor community needs to start rebuilding from the bottom – a thriving nursery, parenting classes, healthy eating, a child mental health team based at the school. And yet … There are grave doubts as to whether it is sustainable. School rolls are falling and a large chunk of the costs have been borne by New Deal money which runs out in three or four years’ time. What then?
Friday, 22 April
A brief chat with Jack. ‘I am spending more time in the constituency than at any time since 1987,’ he said. As well he might since about a third of his voters are Muslims. ‘The older Muslims are okay, but I have had some trouble with the younger ones.’ The good news is that he has about half a dozen fringe candidates competing for the dissident vote so they should divide it up between them, leaving Jack relatively unscathed.
Monday, 25 April
The postal votes go out tomorrow, but still no sign of my election address in the mail. The bloody Post Office. We busted a gut to comply with their copious rules, including the ludicrous insistence that we deliver them, bagged and bundled, to Hexham – 40 miles away. They’ve had five days to deliver and not one has yet arrived. If they don’t come in tomorrow’s post it will be too late.
Tuesday, 26 April
Kevin has been in touch with the Post Office, who were uncharacteristically apologetic, and swore that all my 10,000 postal voters will receive their election address by the close of business today. I am sceptical, but by nightfall we are receiving calls on our election telephone, which indicates that some at least have been delivered.
Wednesday, 27 April
Awoke this morning to the news that the Tories are neck and neck with us in the marginals, so Michael Howard’s campaign is paying off, which presumably means that he will keep up the bombardment until polling day. Meanwhile we are said to be on the point of responding with a campaign entitled ‘Nightmare on Howard Street’. For goodness’ sake. This is war, not some schoolboy jape.
Friday, 29 April
To York Terrace, Silksworth, where gangs of truanting, feral youths are making a misery of the lives of the law-abiding citizens who live along the old railway track (now a cycle path) that used to connect the pit villages to the port. They want my help to close the cut that enables raiding parties of youths to come and go at will. Personally, I doubt whether closing the cut will make much difference. The problem has many causes – not least that 15 years after The Fall of Thatcher we are still manufacturing semi-literate, unemployable, useless youths, many of them second- or third-generation yob culture. I promise to do what I can, however, even though the local authority has already produced a list of reasons why nothing can be done. After leaving the complainants, I took a stroll down the said cut to the railway track and, sure enough, there were a gang of seven or eight youths up to no good in the bushes behind the terrace, some lobbing stones at the houses. And this at noon on a Friday. Goodness knows what they get up to after dark. On the way back to the office I stop off at the local community police, who, in keeping with the spirit of the times, are now based in the local school. We have a friendly enough chat, but it is a bit worrying that all half-dozen of them are sitting desk-bound in a hermetically sealed room rather than out and about among their flock. What must we do to get these guys to engage with the public they are supposed to be serving?
The polls keep saying we will win, but where are all these Labour voters? The Man took another hammering last night, answering questions in front of a (deeply hostile) live television audience. All this ‘Blair is a liar’ nonsense is beginning to degrade the entire political process. Actually, the only outright lie told during the course of this campaign was Michael Howard’s assertion at the outset that we have uncontrolled immigration. The only consolation is that the electorate appear to loathe Howard even more than they do The Man.
Tuesday, 3 May
Iraq haunts us to the end. Every day a new atrocity and (almost) every day a new defection. Greg Dyke at the weekend. Today the young widow of a soldier killed in Basra is all over the media blaming The Man personally for his death. Even so, if the polls are to be believed, our support is holding up and the Tories remain becalmed. There are even tentative signs of a backlash. I spent the afternoon canvassing the flats at Gilley Law and, later, at Silksworth and several people came to The Man’s defence over the dead soldier, saying that it was the job of soldiers to put their lives at risk and that anyway our armed forces were all volunteers.
The Lib Dems have fought a very good campaign. They were right about Iraq. They may not be wrong about Council Tax either. Charles Kennedy has come across as decent and straightforward, in contrast to Michael Howard and Our Own Dear Leader. They deserve to be rewarded but, please God, not too much.
Wednesday, 4 May
Steve Byers rang to discuss what line I should take in my ‘victory’ speech. I have prepared two different versions. One upbeat, if we seem to be on course for a third term, and one for use in the event of impending catastrophe. Steve says that, whatever the outcome, he does not want to go back into government (The Man rang this morning and Steve said no). Alan Milburn has still to make up his mind, but according to Steve he is unlikely to. Alan’s partner, Ruth, is strongly against. When Alan went back last time, to help run the election campaign, The Man actually rang Ruth to persuade her to let him go for a few months. Plus, I guess, The Friends of The Man know that the game is almost up. If they were to rejoin the regime, it would only be for a few months at most. Even so, I asked Steve to pass the message that I wish to stay exactly where I am.
I asked how The Man was bearing up. ‘Not well. This morning he sounded distant. Not really where it’s at.’ Steve reckons, as I do, that Gordon and his playmates will start playing up, ‘sooner rather than later’.
Thursday, 5 May
General Election Day
Our count was over in 42 minutes, shaving a minute off our previous record. So once again, for about 40 minutes, I was the only MP in the country. It was clear from the exit polls that we were going to win so I gave Version One of the speech, which was apparently broadcast live. It rang a bit hollow, though, because we were clearly in for a bad night. The little people were in bed by about one. Ngoc and I sat up until around three, when it became clear that Steve Twigg had lost at Enfield.* The wheel has come full circle.
Friday, 6 May
Sunderland, 9 a.m.
We have lost 47 seats. In London the swing to the Tories was stronger than expected (the Evening Standard factor?). Some bright spots. Jack had an excellent result in Blackburn. Ann Cryer is safely back in Keighley, in the teeth of strong opposition from both medievalist Muslims and the BNP. Ann Campbell (Cambridge), Jon Owen Jones (Cardiff Central) and astonishingly Keith Bradley
(Manchester Withington) have fallen to the students and we have had close shaves in other student strongholds like Durham and Newcastle. Elsewhere the odious Tim Collins fell to the Lib Dems and incredibly we held Dorset South, but in east London George Galloway triumphed over Oona King. At Blaenau Gwent a popular independent has triumphed over a woman imposed by Central Casting (yet another New Labour fix comes unstuck. Will they ever learn?). The Man looks exhausted and miserable. He knows, of course, that for him The End is Nigh.
As for me, I shall just sit tight in my northern stronghold and await The Call. Or not, as the case may be.
12 noon
A long talk to Jack, who was on his way back to London, buoyed up by his unexpectedly good result. ‘I’ll do my best for you,’ he said. I’m sure he will. Jack always sticks by his friends.
5.30 p.m.
Bharat called to say that Jack’s boxes are being moved back into his office; a sure sign that he has been reappointed. An announcement is expected later this evening.
8 p.m.
A message on the answerphone from Bharat to say that Denis Mac-Shane is out. He is to be replaced by Douglas Alexander, a less colourful, but safer pair of hands. Poor Denis will be upset, although not surprised.
Sunday, 8 May
A growing chorus of calls for The Man to go. So far, in public at least, they are confined to the Usual Suspects (Frank Dobson the latest), but who knows where it will end. Of course, the insurgents are being cheered on by the Telegraph et al who are only too keen to see us behaving as if we lost the election. Whatever happens, we mustn’t play into their hands.