[Oboogie]

So after a year's suspension Diane's back but nothing has changed, here she is defending Putin again.
How is Burnham going to explain this the next time he speaks to Zelensky?

[davidjay]

So he pisses off sensible Labour voters and hands the Tories another target. Nice one Andy.

[mattomac]

Independent Labour panels always a law onto themselves.

I believe she doesn’t have the whip.

[Oboogie]

Independent Labour panels always a law onto themselves.

I believe she doesn’t have the whip.

She has had the whip restored.
https://www.theguardian.com/politics/20 ... labour-mps

[davidjay]

What was the point, except to be different to Starmer?

[Tubby Isaacs]

That was the point. Plus there's a bunch of people in Labour who don't think what she keeps saying is that bad, and it's easier to keep them onside if you let her back in.

[Abernathy]

I don’t think the decision to let Abbott back into the party was Burnham’s. These things are decided with reference to an independent review body, with the final decision being the chief whip’s.

I dare say that Burnham will have taken a view, though. Something along the LBJ observation that it’s better to have Diane inside the tent pissing out than her being outside the tent pissing in.

[The Weeping Angel]

Why was she given the whip back again?

[davidjay]

She was brought back because Starmer kept her out.

[Abernathy]

Diane Abbott has never been more utterly irrelevant than she is right now. Which historically is quite a high bar to be cleared.

What you can guarantee with absolute certainty is that Abbott will regularly and publicly say something totally fatuous, idiotic, and/or even borderline racist/anti-semitic.

She's 72 now, and doesn't have much life left in her - either politically speaking, or, one suspects, speaking medically.

She can certainly be ignored.

[Malcolm Armsteen]

But she won't be. Now that she has had the whip restored she will, to some, be 'the authentic voice of Labour'.

How does that disloyalty feel when it's incoming, Andy?

[Tubby Isaacs]

This is what lots of that Campaign Group left really think. People who bang on about "solidarity" all the time. The depth of their hostility to democratized Eastern Europe really is astonishing.

[Youngian]

Diane's a seasoned TV pundit who will see out her days like Tony Benn dispensing senior wisdom on our screens and radios.

[Oboogie]

Diane's a seasoned TV pundit who will see out her days like Tony Benn dispensing senior wisdom on our screens and radios.

Without Benn's wit and charm.

[Tubby Isaacs]

Diane's a seasoned TV pundit who will see out her days like Tony Benn dispensing senior wisdom on our screens and radios.

I came across a hilarious speech by Tony Benn from 1990 about Poland, where he attacked Lech Walesa for... speaking to some private investors. The rest of it was even worse.

[davidjay]

I can't help but think what a waste her political career has been. She could have been an inspiration to women, to black youth, to disadvantaged children everywhere. Instead she'll be remembered as a figure of fun.