Missing the point.

With her tweeted photo of a house, a white van and England flags Emily Thornberry has managed to blow any political capital that Ed Miliband may have been able to make from the Tories capitulation to UKIP in Rochester and Strood. She’s also exposed, at a stroke, one of the problems that Labour needs to address if it’s to be considered a credible political party.

The Labour party’s big problem, post-Blair, is that it doesn’t seem to remember what it stands for (hint: the clue’s in the name). There is a chasm between traditional working class Labour and the Blairish metropolitan elite, of which Thornberry’s tweet was a particularly sneery, unlovable example. It seems to have forgotten the working class, and if you neglect your traditional voter base,, you’re going to struggle.

What seems particularly odd is that the photo was of a white van. The shorthand is simple. White van = tradesman = works with hands = working class. This is the equation which should have been running through Thornberry’s head. But at some point this equation has altered to become: white van = Sun reader = bigot. Couple this with England flags and well, there you go. Must be a racist, like UKIP, easy.

This disrespectful attitude to the electorate encapsulated the dichotomy at the heart of Labour. It is the reason why its grassroots erodes, not to the Tories, but some fall for UKIP, others simply drift away, disillusioned by a party which no longer seems to speaks to them.