Labour conference: Brighton gossip upstages weary slogans

This being Brighton, there were a lot of distractions between railway station and conference centre. These included a street entertainer who wanted a child to volunteer and let him hammer a nail into their head. Volunteers proving elusive, he hammered the nail into his own head. That may be a metaphor for the state of the Labour party.

The gossip was the latest allegation concerning Damian McBride, Gordon Brown's spin-doctor who makes Alastair Campbell seem like a paragon of truth, beauty and probity. The latest, not from Mr McBride's own book, is that he bedded a Labour minister - for the avoidance of doubt: female - in a "drunken one-night stand". The couple didn't even have the decency to follow ancient custom and check into a hotel in Brighton.

The conference itself was far less exciting. The stage was set promisingly enough: it ran the full length of the hall, 50 yards at a guess, wide enough to accommodate a live version of Abel Gance's Napoleon film. The slogan was the one that Ed Miliband stole from the Conservative last year: One Nation. And the background was a fetching shade of Tory blue. The foreground was less intriguing.

Sunday is usually showbiz day at these events: a year ago Labour had the US academic Michael Sandel, brilliantly offering philosophical flesh to clothe the bones of Labour's instincts on social justice. Those now seem like halcyon days for the party. This year there was a parade of witless cliche and slogan-mongers.

The most important "debate" involved education. Labour's conference exists halfway between the genuine deliberations of the Lib Dems and the sit-down-and-shut-up instruction to Tory delegates. Members can catch the chairman's eye and speak, though it is not easy - even a woman frantically waving an inflatable palm tree failed to get on.

Those who make it to the rostrum usually turn out to be union organisers and/or aspirant or prospective parliamentary candidates practising their campaign rhetoric. The notional subject is almost irrelevant.

"Hard-working people . . . hard-pressed families . . . really struggling . . . Tory cuts . . . not seen since the 1930s . . . raw deal of austerity . . . replace despair with hope . . . many not just the few . . . forgotten 50 per cent . . . total complacency . . . "

The Labour shadow on education is Stephen Twigg, who everyone remembers as the bemused young man who unseated Michael Portillo in the most vibrant moment of Tony Blair's first election triumph. But 16 years have passed, the young man is edging towards 50 and looks more trunky than twiggy. He did not sound like a serious opposition politician, let alone a putative cabinet minister. In his favour, he does look increasingly like the late Tony Hancock.

There should be rich pickings for Labour in attacking the combination of privatisation, nationalisation and personal ministerial self-aggrandisement that is the essence of government schools policy. But in a feeble speech, Mr Twigg concentrated largely on childcare, content to let Michael Gove ride on with the narrative that education did not exist in Britain until he invented it.

This speech came after that of Johann Lamont who, in a party whose leadership has long been dominated by Scots, is the improbable leader of Scottish Labour. "Not to be confused with Johann von Lamont," says her Wikipedia page, referring to the Scottish-German 19th century scientist who calculated the orbits of the moons of Uranus and Saturn. Well quite: he was a bloke; this one's a mother-of-two. Also, he was probably less predictable in his opinions.

Later came Yvette Cooper in her capacity as equality spokesman. More weary slogans. One's memory of Labour government is that some are always more equal than others.

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