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That speech in full


In which your correspondent writes a fully-annotated hard-hitting analysis of Jeremy Corbyn’s speech to conference...
Well, no, I’m not. I’ve got the kids’ tea to cook and a pile of work-related paperwork to do, so I’ve frankly not the time. What I would say I took from it was rather what I take from Corbyn itself. I’m slightly unconvinced but it makes a refreshing change. It had compassion and emotion, and in that it differed from pretty much all other Leader’s speeches since I started taking an interest *coughcough* years ago. It was refreshing to hear the word “kindness” being used. I struggle to imagine Cambo using it. The delivery was a pleasant change also, halting and unpolished, it convinced. It seemed genuine. One of the biggest mistakes Ed Miliband made was trying to be smooth and polished when it seems likelier that he’s a bit of a berk. Cambo CAN do smooth and polished, but it comes off as oily and smug. So hats off to Jez for apparently shunning any sort of image coaching. It’s an anti-image, and I suspect it’s a part of his appeal.

Yes, it did seem a little light on policy, but we’re a long way out from an election yet. In calling for the government to intervene in everything from the Redcar steelworks closure to executions in Saudi Arabia it seemed to hark back to an earlier time, when politicians believed in sticking their oars in, when politicians actually appeared to believe in things.

Now regular readers (all one of you) will be aware of my aversion to gushing, so I would sound a note of caution to all the excitable Corbynistas out there in social media land. It was a good speech, it included a lot of laudable ideas, but how far it stretched beyond the Labour party itself I don’t know. But perhaps it marked the start of a fight-back. It was a clear delineation. It will be harder to trot out the old saw about all the parties being the same. And that will do, for starters.

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