In the pay of the Daily Mail!

Challenge to Labour MPs who write for the right-wing press

 

IN last Saturday's Rochdale Observer Jim Dobbin, the Labour MP for Castleton, Norden & Bamford, lashed out saying: 

'It upsets me when Labour parliamentarians go public and criticise the leadership.  Those are issues for internal debate and discussion and should not be subject of interviews on television or the right wing press...  some of the parliamentary articles I have read recently, some of them paid articles, do political harm to parties and politicians and very little to address the real issues for individuals and communities.'

 

This attack comes at a time when the Rochdale Labour Party is experiencing some turmoil over who will be the leader of the Labour group on the local council.  This issue should be cleared up tonight when the former council leader Colin Lambert is to face an attempt by Richard Farnell to overthrow him.  Councillor Farnell was the leader of the Rochdale Council in the early 1990s, some councillors have encouraged him to stand against Councillor Lambert. 

 

Councillor Lambert's style of leadership has been described as 'abrasive' by some councillors, but his position has not been helped by the scandals such as those of sexual grooming and the continual controversies surrounding the inquires into Knowl View special school.  Even Richard Farnell himself has been questioned as to his knowledge of what was going on at Knowl View while he was leader of the council in the 1990s:  so far he has failed to comment on this.

 

The Rochdale Labour M.P. Simon Danczuk has been strongly critical of the Rochdale Council under Colin Lambert's leadership; both over the grooming scandal and over the council's conduct of the investigation into Knowl View.  Many of his attacks have appeared in the media, and he has also blasted the leadership of the Labour Party nationally in the press, some of this he has done in articles paid for by the Daily Mail.

 

Indeed, on the day of the launch of his book in April Mr. Danczuk justified his getting paid by the right-wing press by saying that the Mail was the 'best newspaper', and in joke, that Paul Dacre was a bit 'too left-wing' for him.  At the same time he assured us that he was not involved in a 'moral crusade' of the Mary Whitehouse type.  This may be the kind cavalier conduct that worries Jim Dobbin M.P.