Whither Adonis?

High praise must go to the courage of the Transport Secretary, Lord Adonis, for his unequivocal criticism of the Unite union’s conduct over the BA strike.

Speaking on The Andrew Marr Show, Adonis said:

“The stakes are incredibly high. I absolutely deplore the strike;, it is not only the damage it is going to do to passengers and the inconvenience it’s going to cause — which is quite disproportionate to the issues at stake — but also the threat it poses to the future of one of our great companies in this country.

“It’s totally unjustified. I do call on the union to engage constructively with the company at this late stage.”

Contrast Adonis’s admirable plain speaking with the mealy-mouthed comments that have thus far come from Gordon Brown, who has merely said that “the disruption to services is unacceptable”.

Readers who have spent the last three years marooned on a remote desert island may wish to know that:

• Charlie Whelan, Unite’s political director, is Gordon Brown’s former spin doctor;
• it is widely anticipated that Whelan will have a central role in Labour’s general election campaign;
• Labour has received up to 25 per cent of its funding from Unite since Gordon Brown became Prime Minister;
• Unite’s deputy general secretary, Jack Dromey, was recently selected as parliamentary candidate for Birmingham Erdington.  Proposals that the selection should be made from an all-women shortlist were overruled by Labour’s National Executive Committee;
• Mr Dromey is the husband of Labour’s deputy leader, Harriet Harman.

Sadly, I strongly suspect that Lord Adonis’s political career is unlikely to advance significantly further.