A distraction

Unless there’s a shop in Rochdale that sells something called ‘tectonic plates’ in which George Galloway had a bull in a china shop experience, his victory speech last night contained little of significance for the general direction of political events in the UK. The commentariat have already dismissed his success as fleeting and of little consequence. It’s hard not to agree. Galloway’s record is relatively successful in by-elections but he generally stands down or loses at the subsequent general election. Electoral Calculus gives him a 5% chance of winning later this year. If anything I fear that Galloway’s victory will stiffen Starmer’s support for Israel’s war against Palestinians since that is precisely the reaction one would expect from the establishment when faced with a controversialist disrupter. Starmer I doubt will imagine that there are any lessons to be learnt from Gorgeous George’s victory, since Labour had effectively pulled out of the contest. Nothing to see here, move on. But Labour does need to quickly select its next Rochdale parliamentary candidate to mount an effective campaign against Galloway. I’m not sure I would describe Galloway as a populist so it was cheering at least to see that the party of populists, Reform performed so badly. Perhaps they chose the wrong candidate. At least over the next few months the re-insertion of Galloway into parliament may provide a distraction from the equally voluble Lee Anderson.