As the Labour Party Leadership ballot box slams firmly shut, the pound-shop Machiavelli, Luke Akehurst, has adopted the position of a petulant adolescent that cannot own up to failure, by suggesting that beating Jeremy Corbyn was never really the point of Owen Smith’s dysfunctional leadership challenge.
Akehurst has tweeted that: “Winning this time not the main point of having a contest. Point is to start a process that may take several goes. And stop moderates resigning.”
winning this time not the main point of having a contest.
— Luke Akehurst (@lukeakehurst) August 31, 2016
point is to start a process that may take several goes. & stop moderates resigning.
— Luke Akehurst (@lukeakehurst) August 31, 2016
He went on to say that:
@David__Osland no we were advocating a challenge for months in full expectation of losing. Strategically this challenge has been helpful.
— Luke Akehurst (@lukeakehurst) September 20, 2016
There you have it. Allowing the Tories a free reign, allowing Labour to plummet in the polls, and allowing Labour to lose control of Bristol City Council, are all part of a plan to prevent the falsely named ‘moderates’ from feeling the need to leave the party. What a cosseted and rarefied life that Akehurst and fellow travellers must lead if they can afford to play such damaging and antidemocratic games to protect their own self-interest, swollen egos and meal-tickets. The country and the Labour Party can go to rack and ruin just as long as the ‘moderates’ don’t stamp their feet and f*ck off to the Liberal Democrats.
Furthermore, Akehurst’s comments reveal exactly what the likes of Ummuna, Kendall, Hunt, Cooper, Austin, Streeting, Reed etc really think about Owen Smith. He has been sacrificed as their useful idiot. Smith’s inflated ego doesn’t allow him to see that he has been hoodwinked by his peers. They could not and would not support many of the polices that he has advocated over the last couple of months.
The ‘moderates’ claim it is Jeremy Corbyn that is helping the Tories, yet it is their persistent spoiling that is boosting Theresa May. To rub salt into the wounds, Akehurst et al are using money from the members they despise in order to pay for internal Labour Party elections. The brass-neck on these people is astounding.
Since the Labour Party’s inception, it is the left that has had to compromise, the left that has had to unify, the left that has had to stand in line and shut up, the left that is fair-game to be smeared, purged and deselected. The right of the party never has and never will compromise. Their cultish and entitled arrogance means that they think they own Labour Party and the direction it should take. Their collective behaviour since day one of Corbyn’s leadership conclusively proves the point.
You can only imagine the damage that Akehurst’s suggestion of repeated leadership elections will do to the Labour Party. Yet it won’t be the fault of the ‘moderates’ that instigate them. It will be the fault of the left for resisting them. This is indicative of the illogical positions that the moderates take. When Labour members left the party in 1981 and formed the SDP it was not they who were blamed for splitting the party. Bizarrely it was the left’s fault for not being right-wing (sorry, moderate) enough.
When Tony Blair was the Labour Party leader and left-wing members resigned in their thousands, the call from the ‘moderates’ was – Don’t go. If you wan’t a different Labour Party then stay and fight for change. They omitted the caveat that – if you do stay and fight (and win) we will lie, brief, smear, spoil, campaign, and force repeated leadership elections until we have our own way again.
The oafish ex-arms lobbyist Akehurst cuts a pathetic figure. He likes to think of himself as someone with influence, who is in the know, and who has access to the top-table. In reality he is just a low level attack-dog, and a dispensable buffoon. He and Labour wanted and and needed to beat Corbyn in this election. Don’t let them kid you otherwise, with their laughable claims of – ‘losing as a strategy for winning.’
That said, maybe I am wrong. Maybe Akehurst is much more astute than I give him credit for. Maybe he really is the sub-par Mandelson he like to think. It could be that when he was utterly routed at the recent elections for the Labour Party NEC, it was a tactical masterstroke. Time will tell. 
