Labour's Second Best MP To Stand Down.

Austin Mitchell, Labour MP for Greater Grimsby, has announced that he will stand down at the next election. He is 79 years old, has been an MP for 37 years and last year was rushed to hospital after collapsing in the Commons.

So on the face of it, not the most surprising development.

But for Ed Miliband, I suspect, the news will have privately generated much glee.

For Mitchell has become one of the Labour leader’s bêtes noires. Indeed, as he puts it himself in masterly understatement: ‘I think Ed Miliband will probably be a bit relieved.’

For, as well as tirelessly campaigning as a local MP — particular

ly in defence of his beloved Grimbsy fishermen — Mitchell has made goodness knows how many off-message comments and, more recently, tweeted a steady stream of inflammatory, occasionally sexist messages that have embarrassed the Labour leadership.

Even a comment on YouTube after his retirement announcement caused a minor furore. It said: ‘Ed Miliband needs to get out and mix with ordinary people.’

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2654679/Miliband-A-political-freak-Prescott-He-touched-wife.html#ixzz34IwRNWfF
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