Goodbye David Miliband -

 - and good riddance.

The paeans of praise gushing around Miliband senior must have been very satisfying for the chap. Oh how troubled he has been, wrestling with his desire to serve his constituents, and his party, and yet not undermine his beloved brother. Bollocks.

He actually claimed that the life of a back bench MP was important to him. Oh yeah. 

Try this for size 

“May 2012: Paid £14,000 for three hours work speaking at a conference paid for by hedge fund investors including Tory donor Michael Hintze and Mitt Romneys former employer Bain Capital.

May 2012: Paid £12,500 for four hours ‘work’ speaking to Bridgepoint, a company who’s interests include NHS privatisation - it owns the hospital contractor, Care UK.

August 2012: Paid £4000 by Qatari government for addressing the Doha Forum Conference on Middle Eastern security.” Private Eye, September 2012

Also

“£30,200 per year for advising Indus Basin Holdings which invests in Pakistani food crops.

£92,840 per year for advising VantagePoint Capital - a US technology investment firm.

£65,000 per year for helping the United Arab Emirates government host a high profile international conference.” (ibid)

Not content with that, he also gets £75,000 per year for being Vice-Chairman of Sunderland football club. Mind you he has to work 12 - 15 days a year to ‘earn’ the money. In all he has made over £500,000 in one year. Which does not include the £66,000 he claims as an MP.

He is clearly following in the footsteps of the Reverend Blair, who makes the Televangelists  of the Deep South of the U S of A look abject and bereft.  

He attended under half of the votes held in the Commons and made 15 parliamentary speeches in the last year. He represented one of the poorest constituencies in the country. It contains Jarrow within its boundaries. The descendants of the Hunger Marchers are surely not happy to see their MP swanning about around the world, making a fortune while they struggle to put food on the table. 

And that is not to mention his collusion with rendition and ‘black prisons’ and all that entailed. Perhaps the enquiries currently ongoing are getting close to home? A secure position in the States would make it harder for m’learned friends to get at him.

It is a thought.

Another thought -  good riddance.