According to an article in today's Guardian, there is discord at the New Statesman magazine, following their recent issue, guest edited by Alistair Campbell. Apparently, staff and subscribers are unhappy that Campbell's issue represents some kind of toadying to New Labour.
I haven't read the magazine regularly since I left sixth-form in 1990. On the odd occasion I have glanced at it since, it has struck me as rather naive, and earnest in a way that would appeal to an eighteen year old wannabe socialist.
If anything, the outrage confirms this opinion. The opposition to Campbell (and Blair by obvious association) centres on the Iraq war, and his perceived involvement with the 'dodgy dossier'. I find myself asking did it really take the Iraq war to convince the New Statesman's readers that New Labour weren't all that great?
The Guardian quotes, former Statesman journalist, Nick Cohen accusing the magazine of having "a highly conformist and narrow intellectual view of the left." This may be true, but I think that the knee-jerk reaction to this issue is equally narrow. It seems there is an orthodoxy amongst the Hampstead set, from where the magazine draws its main post-sixth-form following, that anything to do with New Labour, Blair or Iraq is automatically suspect, and Campbell is the Devil incarnate.
There is certainly a debate to be had on the future if the British left; and Campbell, like him or not, has something to contribute to that. He, more than most, understands the current position of the Labour Party, not least because he played a big part in putting it there. It would be churlish, and narrow-minded, to ignore him because he has been associated with some things we don't like very much.
As he no longer enjoys an official position in the party, it does not compromise any kind of journalistic impartiality to ask him to make an editorial contribution. I was even considering buying a copy for the first time in years before this controversy blew up. I almost certainly will now, although it will largely be for the interview with Fergie.
