A Glasgow Kiss

So....we lost Glasgow East.
I have to admit I am not surprised.
I knocked on the door of many a Glasgow oik, and I could tell that they were intimidated by my rank and femininity.

I had to keep an inane grin on (see above pic), as these filthy peasants slammed their doors in my face, and wouldn't talk to me unless i got a hairy Scottish oaf (Des Browne see below) to do the talking while the women kept back!


The ignominy! The SNP candidate meanwhile was invited in for cups of sugary tea. I knew then that all was lost.

The reason for this terrible result, as with most things in this country is sexism.
It is not a co-incidence that our recent beleagured candidates, Tamsin Dunwoody, Margaret Curran and even Wendy Alexander have all been women.

The men of Glasgow East, like those in Crewe clearly could not rise above their prejudice to do the right thing and vote for Labour.
Labour has done so much for this impoverished area which is quite similar to my own constituency of Peckham - I'd be just as likely to wear a stab vest around the Glasgow East council estates for instance.

With any luck this by-election result will be the last nail in Gordon's coffin and I can finally take over and become Britain's first female prime minster. I will then be able to implement more aggressive equality bills e.g all-women shortlists whenever there is a vacancy for a FTSE100 chief executive. I can assure you there would be no credit crunch if women had been making the decisions in the banks and companies nationwide.

Where has Harriet Been?

Sorry for not making any updates at all in the past week. I'm a busy woman you know!
Besides, parliament was in recess, (again!) and that means that we MPs should be taking time off from our usual activities including blogging.
So, 10 points for whoever can guess what I've been up to this past week.

a) Trying to raise funds for the Labour Party* before it bankrupts me
b) Gathering up supporters to oust Gordon
c) Crushing Crazy Nadine's dream of being an influential politician
d) Sorting out my £23,000 payrise,
e) Recovering from the Crewe and Nantwich disaster.
f) All of the above.

*Seriously

Boo and Sandwich

Everyone is talking about Crewe and Nantwich -yawn.
You probably haven't heard, but there is a by-election happening there, tomorrow.
It shows how inexperienced Labour is at running campaigns. They should have got me, winner of the 2007 Deputy Leadership election to do it. Instead they played the toff card. A big no-no and trust me, my Uncle was the Earl of Longford, never never talk about toffs. It always comes back to bite you in the ass.

Personally, I blame the problems on Gwyneth Dunwoody.
She should have named her daughter "Gwyneth" instead of Tamsin or Moyra*
That way people wouldn't have noticed it was someone else running.


Most people are forgetting that she spent her last years voting against government bills with the Tories. Gwyneth was a selfish old biddy, always putting herself and her constituents before the Labour Party. I bet she was a double agent and the loss of that constituency will make no difference whatsoever.

*Good Heavens, What was she thinking!
**BLOGGING MAY BE LIGHT TILL THE WEEKEND - PLEASE BEAR WITH THE INFREQUENT SERVICE.

Naomi Campbell rescues the Labour Party

Being a leader often means coming up with innovative solutions to difficult problems.
I'd been thinking about how to fix this temporary dip in the polls and then it struck me...what Labour needs is a celebrity. Someone who can shore up our core vote and is a good role model for kids. So I looked in the phone book for a talent agency and asked who they could rustle up as quickly as possible. We were in luck. It turned out that Naomi Campbell is on bail for assaulting a police officer and would happily get out of bed for less than £10,000.

Female Vote - check
Black Vote - check
Tall Vote - check

So, I told Naomi on the phone that if anyone asks what she was doing there, she should just say "Women's Health Issues" -easily the most uncomfortable topic for aggressive male journalists. I also told her to say something nice about Gordon, something surprising like "he's a barrel of laughs" or " very jolly". Just watch the video to see how well she does



Naomi and Gordon have lots of things in common. She has been to anger management and he is known to get into fits of indescribable rage, so they got on well together and she gave him a couple of tips . She might even have given style advice to frumpy Sarah Brown while she was there.

When the world is beating at your door with a recession, inflation, tax palavers, housing issues, climate change, godawful election results and a suspiciously inconvenient by-election, Naomi Campbell is just the pick-me-up we need to take everyone's minds off the problems.

Besides the only other option was to go with Hazel Blear's idea An Apprentice/Maria/Strictly Come Dancing show starring Gordon, which I thought was completely bonkers - everyone knows Gordon can't sing or dance!* It just goes to show that when it comes to the Labour Party, truth will always out-parody fictional spoofs.

*or be in a competition where he's not the only contestant

Reassuring Party Members - A letter from Harriet

I sent the following email to Labour party members during the chaos. Gordon really should have been writing it, but we didn't want to make things worse. You need someone who is able to write with plenty of meaning hidden between the lines. I have filled in the blanks for you below.

A heartfelt thank you to all party members and party staff who worked so hard in the elections on May 1.
Dear Peasants.. I mean Comrades! Thanks for nothing, which would have been better than your half-arsed campaigning efforts on May 1st.

Congratulations to newly elected and re-elected councillors and Greater London Assembly members.
However, Congratulations to those of you who probably stood unopposed or at least managed to escape the slaughter and carnage by rigging the postal vote system.

It was good to see the gains that we made, including in Slough, Liverpool, Ipswich and Oxford and the increase in our vote for the GLA in London.
It was good to see that there are still some people out there who will vote for a donkey as long as it wears a Red Rosette.

But it was a tough night for the party in Wales, and in England And I want to pay tribute to our council leaders and all our councillors who lost,
To the losers who think that the night was tough, think again. We will probably be obliterated in the next general election and you can kiss goodbye to any hope of a peerage or parliamentary career or any advancement in Labour Party politics and all the perks that would have awaited you

and to Ken Livingstone who did so much in improving policing, housing and securing the Olympics
and to that odious little man who thought he was the Emperor of London, whose improved policing now means I can't go into my own constituency without a stab vest, and getting London the Olympics which are now costing £100 billion instead of £1 billion * and which your grandchildren will still be paying for 2062., Good riddance!

This election was dominated by the economy and it is clear that people are feeling the pinch.
The election was dominated by the fact that we removed the 10p tax band, to make things easier for the middle class and boy did those working class oiks feel the pinch!

As the Prime Minister said, "We have to listen as well as lead", this means listening widely and responding wisely.
As the Prime Minister proudly repeated the hypnotic meaningless guff that I taught him, remember that we are NOT a listening party, why? BECAUSE WE KNOW BEST! However as long as we TELL people that we're listening, then that's alright.

One consequence of the results of Thursday's elections is that there will now be closer scrutiny of what the Conservatives are proposing.
One consequence of the results of Thursday's elections is that there are fewer footsoldiers to deliver our leaflets in the next election.
People will have no choice but to read the Tory leaflets. Sh*t.

We will now step up our attack on the Conservative Party.
We will now step up our attack on them with the few wounded troops we have left.
As long as people remember that they are nasty and racists, we can continue to put up donkey candidates i.e you, my beloved comrades and keep winning elections.

Our values are clear and our commitment is strong.
Our values are clear enough and our commitment to remaining in power come hell or high water remains strong.

Working together we will make progress for the hard working families of Britain.
[EVIL LAUGH]
We haven't made much progress for the hard working families of Britain, but keep voting for us as we're working on it.
It is always darkest before the light at the end of the tunnel .

Thank you so much for your support
Best wishes,
Harriet Harman
Deputy Leader of the Labour Party
Thanking you for your support in advance of the upcoming leadership election.
Best Wishes,
Don't forget to vote for Harriet Harman as Leader of the Labour Party after conference... YOU KNOW IT'S GOING TO HAPPEN DON'T FIGHT IT!

*although that's partly Tessa's fault to be fair

Rising from the Ashes

I'm sure you don't need to ask where I've been these last few days.On the plus side, at least we won back Slough council!

I've been doing the rounds from studio to studio and comforting our people on the ground. After the scale of Thursday's election disaster, only a woman could do the damage limitation for Labour properly.

In testing times, people want someone to soothe and calm their nerves. Can Hazel soothe? (HA!) Can Jacqui soothe (don't think so!) err... who else is left? That's right. NO ONE. They should call me Harriet "Soothing" Harman.

Useless Gordon, wheeling me out at such an ungodly hour, 7:30am for pity's sake to make excuses for him while he cowered behind his desk.
I received an anonymous text while I was on air. "Do you have any idea how nauseating it is to have to listen to you say over and over and over again that Labour will be "more focused on listening to people and more in touch". The cheek! To be fair, I'm not sure anyone bought that rubbish. What Labour has to do is "listen and learn"?
What we really need to do is dump Gordon and get someone who isn't so bloody weird e.g. me.

Imagine it. If Gordon resigns... I would become by default, Britain's first female Prime Minister.

Don't worry though. I gave Macavity a piece of my mind and got him out there to face the music with his favourite interviewer Andrew Marr who doesn't have the balls to ask him tough questions. It did not go well. Clearly Marr's Dr. Jekyll wasn't in the building and left Dr. Jekyll to man the studio. Dear, oh Dear. Easily the most humiliating interview Gordon's ever had to do. Talk about kicking a man when he's down. Sick Stuff. At least Paxman is consistent!

Sometimes I almost feel sorry for Gordon, he had absolutely no idea what he was getting himself into, but I mustn't grumble as his loss is my gain. People would be crazy not to make me leader after the hash he's made of things!

I admit I have been giving Gordon lessons (out of pity of course) on how to deal with Cameron at PMQs, My "I will not take lessons from so-and-so" riposte has been working a treat, although I don't know if it is going to work this Wednesday. No line is fool-proof when you've got the lowest share of the vote for Labour in over 40 years. Tomorrow I will be sitting as far away from Gordon on the front benches as possible. It's the sensible thing to do.

Labour NEC Finances in Excellent Health

I've just been pointed to Bastard Ben Brogan's blog post last Thursday. He says

The new general secretary is said to be worried about the state of the party's finances and the rules that say his personal assets could be forfeit if the party goes into liquidation.

Basically, he is saying that members of Labour's National Executive Committee (NEC) would be liable for the loans we took from wealthy people in exchange for peerages. First of all, this is utter crap. If the labour party had financial difficulties, I, Harriet Harman as Deputy Leader would be the first to hear about it. Secondly, as my husband is the labour party treasurer, I know the party finances are in excellent shape, loans or no loans, just as sure as we all know that Alistair Darling will keep the bank of England interest rates low.

The usual suspects, like Fatty Fawkes make hay with scurrilous rumours, but what really annoys me is when our own labour party members start spreading the gossip. LabourHome, the website run by disloyal labour party member and part-time blogger, Alex Hilton, put their version about a few months ago

Do you honestly think that a committe with Gordon Brown (Britain's best ever chancellor!) Jack Dromey, Harriet Harman and Dennis Skinner among others could ever be so stupid to bankrupt ourselves to the tune of £14 million? EXACTLY!

Leadership Woes

Another bad taste article in this morning's Sun.
Gordon hasn't even been in the job a year and they are already talking about a replacement.
People should give Gordon a chance and not talk about "leadership woes" and "Labour's nose-diving poll ratings". All this negativity really does my head in.

But while we're on the subject.... what if there were to be a leadership contest? Say Gordon had a heart attack or got lost mysteriously somewhere, Lord knows it happens often enough!

Jacqui Smith is all but written off

Mrs Smith, 45, has so far failed to make her mark as Home Secretary. While she remains one of just two women candidates with a chance at the top slot, she will have to work a lot harder to win over Labour MPs and card-carrying footsoldiers, who see her as a bit remote and lacking in warmth.


Tessa Jowell is too busy sorting out the gypsies in her backyard, no one is even talking about Hazel Blears.. Harriet Harman, 57, is the only other woman candidate in with a shout. She performed better than expected when she stood in for Mr Brown at Prime Minister’s Questions last week and cannot be written off despite her reputation for being obsessed with political correctness. She has also already proven a hit with the Labour machine by winning the deputy leadership contest last summer.

heh heh!
Leaves me nicely positioned to sort out the women's corner doesn't it? After all, it is about time that Labour had a female party leader, and I am the most successful female politician the UK has ever had.