Chuka Umunna’s decision to withdraw from the Labour leadership contest (it is not a race) due to the “sheer pressure” of the job should surprise no one. You only need to consider the five years of unrelenting abuse Ed Miliband received from the media to think, “Hmm. I think there are easier ways of earning a living.”
I certainly wouldn’t want to run for high office. Just imagine Katie Hopkins and The Sun trawling over my mental health record or the Mail dwelling on my “tangled love life”. For five long years. And all those photos of me on holiday, falling out of a bar, or attending a fancy dress party as the Pope. I’d be toast before my name appeared on the ballot paper and that would be without me making a mess of eating a bacon sandwich. Perhaps Ed should have had a toasted bacon sandwich instead?
What is it about the media in this country that they feel the need to find every single detail about someone who is in the public eye? Why do they feel the need to camp out on the front lawns of elderly relatives in order to solicit a hopefully damaging snippet of information?
Of course, it is legitimate of the press to ensure that politicians are what they say they are, especially if they seek election on the basis of untruths, but how far does it go beyond that? Personally, I am not interested in the private lives of politicians if they live within the law. I am more interested in what they have to say and, more importantly, what they actually do. I want to know what the candidate is going to do with the Bedroom Tax or my human rights, not tittle-tattle about how many kitchens they have.
If Umunna thinks that by withdrawing from the contest will mean his past and present will no longer be raked over by the gutter press, then he can think again. Doubtless the attack-dogs will sent out in force by the Dacres of this world in the hope of finding something to titillate their voyeuristic readers, regardless of his decision to not seek the leadership. And the readers are the issue. Whilst people usually say they are not interested in idle gossip about well-known people, the truth is that someone must be buying these rags. Someone must be queueing outside their newsagents, waiting for their dose of scandal. Perhaps they themselves have lives that are so uninteresting they need the stories of someone else’s lives to keep them going.
Bad news for Labour, possibly bad news for the country, but I very much respect and understand Umunna’s decision. He’s still young and maybe his time will come again and hopefully by then the newspapers and the people who buy them will be more interested in substance rather than irrelevant gossip, but I do not hold out much hope.
