Goodbye Seumas Milne, another press officer who became the story

The departure of Labour’s director of strategy and communications is the most significant evidence of the fall of Corbynism within the party, writes John Rentoul

Tuesday 07 April 2020 21:51 BST
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Seumas Milne, left, and Karie Murphy, Jeremy Corbyn's former chief of staff
Seumas Milne, left, and Karie Murphy, Jeremy Corbyn's former chief of staff (PA/AFP)

Seumas Milne has now “left his role”. This is momentous news. First, it removes the most commonly misspelt name from frontline British politics. That title will now be taken by Keir Starmer.

The Scottish spelling of the name, more commonly spelt Seamus, is one of the former Labour director of strategy and communications’s distinctive features. The other is his ideology, which is why his departure is a significant mark of the decorbynisation of the party under its new leader.

Milne was always a fierce and articulate exponent of the worldview to which Jeremy Corbyn subscribes. His role, when he was “seconded” from The Guardian to the leader’s office, was to be the iron ideological fist in Corbyn’s velvet glove.

This is a simplification. Milne’s courtesy and charm mean that he must be the only person in the country to be on good personal terms with both George Galloway and Peter Mandelson. And Corbyn’s platitudinous and avuncular demeanour sometimes slipped to reveal the sharp edges of dogmatism, as when he hung up the phone on a radio interview when asked to condemn the IRA.

But generally, Milne’s role was a priestly one, to guard the true faith. Labels such as hard left or far left are hard to define. Marxism means pretty much what anyone wants it to mean. Anti-imperialism is a loaded term because it implies that US capitalism is a form of colonialism, but it might be the banner under which Milne and Corbyn would be happiest to fight.

Anyway, we all know what we mean, and if there was any doubt over the past five years, Milne was there to keep the iron in Corbyn’s soul. As spokesperson, he would often clarify the leader’s remarks in the House of Commons to journalists in his briefing afterwards. Yes, Corbyn did mean that it was wrong to blame the Russian government for the Salisbury poisonings, although the leader himself hadn’t quite said that at Prime Minister’s Questions. Yes, Corbyn did mean the US killing of Soleimani, the Iranian general, was “clearly illegal”, even if the leader of the opposition had merely asked a question.

Yes, Emily Thornberry, still then the shadow foreign secretary, did mean Milne when she said, after the election in December: “I think there have been times when we have made decisions and that hasn’t been what has been briefed out to the media.”

As a speechwriter, he was responsible for Corbyn’s well-argued but despicable thesis that Britain’s foreign policy brought terrorism on itself.

Now he has gone. The second of the “four Ms” who controlled the party on Corbyn’s behalf, Andrew Murray, has also gone. Murray, unlike Milne, really was a member of the Communist Party of Britain until Corbyn made Labour Party membership possible for him. Karie Murphy, who was Corbyn’s chief of staff but moved to party HQ before the last election, will presumably join them, as will Jennie Formby, the party general secretary, whose surname inconveniently doesn’t begin with M. The fourth M, Len McCluskey, leader of Unite, is watching his once mighty union’s influence over the party decline.

Milne’s place is taken by Ben Nunn, the party’s new director of communications – no grand “strategy” for him. He worked for Starmer on the shadow Brexit brief for three years and before that worked for Owen Smith’s leadership bid in 2016. He has a good reputation with journalists and with other non-Corbynite Labour staff.

When Milne spoke to journalists he fought a running battle to be reported as “a spokesperson for Mr Corbyn”, when sometimes he would be named (and often spelt correctly), because his known views about Russia, the US or Palestinians seemed relevant.

Nunn, on the other hand, will be the press officer and not the story.

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