Mandy mauled by angry Straw
By Ian Dunt
Jack Straw has launched into an angry tirade against Peter Mandelson, offering further proof that the ex-business secretary’s memoirs have irreversibly damaged his relationship with the Labour party.
The former business secretary was wrong to publish details of confidential conversations so soon after they occurred, Mr Straw argued.
Asked by BBC Radio 5 Live whether he would ever publish memoirs after serving in
Cabinet for over a decade, Mr Straw replied: “They are not written yet and by the way I have never kept a diary, I have got lots of records but no diaries.
“I’m slightly old fashioned. I profoundly disagree with the approach that Peter Mandelson has taken, which was to record entirely confidential private conversations and then to stick them in his diary just a couple of months after that.
“Because if he had ever said to us: I’m going to write this down, I’m going to publish it a couple of weeks after an election, one would have said: Thanks very much Peter, there’s the door.”
The former justice secretary also mentioned that he wanted to say all this to Lord Mandelson’s face, but that he had not had an opportunity to meet him.
He had “disappeared … from my path”, Mr Straw said.
The former justice secretary also had some tough words for the system by which Labour picked its shadow Cabinet.
“It is barking mad, for arithmetical reasons as well, it is a daft system, and what it means is that of the 18 or 19 people in [the] shadow Cabinet, probably a dozen capable of being in the Cabinet, half a dozen are not and if and when we have a Labour government some of those who thought this is a meal ticket in to the proper Cabinet will be sorely disappointed,” he said.
Mr Straw announced he would step down from frontline politics before the new leader was selected.
