IT has been quite a week for one Jeremy Bernard Corbyn from Islington.
At 11.30am last Saturday, the onetime peripheral left-winger was thrust into the centre of British politics by becoming Labour’s new leader. Not just that, he won by a not inconsiderable 60 per cent.
As Corbynmania seeped out of London’s QEII Centre, for two hours hundreds of Jeremy’s faithful supporters plus a gaggle of Her Majesty’s media waited patiently outside for the conquering hero to appear.
But Elvis had slipped out the back and went off to a local pub to thank supporters, down a diet Coke and sing the Red Flag. Later, he would ignore the queue of media interviewers in favour of speaking at a rally supporting the Middle East refugees.
Come Sunday and the Press, having given wall-to-wall Corbyn coverage, were getting used to Jeremy “doing a Frank Sinatra" as he left the traditional appearance on the BBC’s Andrew Marr Show to his deputy Tom Watson. His only public appearance that day was turning up at a local mental health event.
On Monday, the ups and downs of having the “worst job in British politics” began to materialise.
Hours after Hilary Benn, the Shadow Foreign Secretary, insisted Labour would campaign for Britain to stay in the EU “in all circumstances”, Mr Corbyn addressed his first meeting of the Parliamentary Labour Party and told MPs he would not write David Cameron a “blank cheque” and that the party might not campaign for the UK to stay in after all. Was that Mr Benn rolling his eyes at the back?
The following day the right-wing Press had a field day when Mr C turned up at St Paul’s Cathedral to mark the 75th anniversary of the Battle of Britain and failed to sing the national anthem. Shock horror headlines began to appear. Labour HQ later made clear their leader would be singing the anthem lustily at future events.
At lunchtime, the left-winger was on more comfortable ground when he turned up to a hero’s welcome at the TUC conference in Brighton. However, summing up the disorganisation, Jezza was late for his own standing ovation.
The day ended depressingly for the Labour chief when the Cameron Government won the vote on the Welfare Bill; talk of a defeat for the PM dissipated as the band of Tory rebels failed to materialise.
Wednesday was arguably Mr Corbyn’s high point in a rollercoaster week.
His decision to drop the usual Punch and Judy point-scoring at PMQs in favour of a more beige approach of simply asking questions Marie, Gail, etc had emailed in flummoxed the PM. The Labour leader won praise from several quarters for his “more adult” attitude.
After fending off questions about whether he would or would not bend the knee to the Queen when he became a Privy Counsellor, Mr Corbyn made clear in, hooray, an interview with the BBC, that while there would be discussions on many policies, his decision would be “final”.
By Friday, yet more controversy arrived.
Labour insiders could not believe their new chief was not in Scotland to mark the anniversary of the independence referendum; indeed, there was not even a single word of comment on the event. Sports fans were also outraged that Jezza was “snubbing” the Rugby World Cup opening event at Twickers – and, of course, a chance to sing the national anthem.
Then as the quiet of the weekend beckoned, Labour HQ put out the final version of Mr Corbyn’s frontbench team. Jumping out was the name of Lord Mike Watson, convicted fire-raiser, who was now the party’s education spokesman in the Lords.
Party sources recognised it would, so to speak, spark a bit of a row but, they insisted, “Jeremy believes in rehabilitation”.
Given his own time in the political wilderness and his, let's say, Sinatra approach to politics, it should not have come as such a surprise.
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