We have always been at war with Eurasia

It was reported yesterday that Anas Sarwar tried to to heal the rift between Scottish Labour and Westminster.  He did this on Sunday Politics during an interview, in which he distanced himself from the criticisms of UK Labour made by Johann Lamont.

When asked about the event which sparked Ms Lamont's resignation he declared

I can only tell you what I know which is that Ian Price resigned from his position as general secretary and I think we should respect his position.

 Now it has been pretty well established that Mr Price was sacked from his job - the newspapers are unanimous on this point, and it wouldn't be hard to check - all they'd have to do is ask him.  So why is Mr Sarwar now saying that Mr Price resigned?

He may genuinely believe it's true.  Perhaps someone told him this was the case.  Scottish Labour members do have form for parroting things and, when challenged on them, declaring 'that's what we've been told'. He was educated at Hutcheson's Grammar School however, a private school with a good reputation, so you would think that critical thinking would have been on the curriculum.

He may be trying to ingratiate himself with the UK Labour leadership.  He's one of the leading candidates to take over the leadership of Labour in Scotland, and it would appear that an essential qualification will be to be in good standing with the big boys at Westminster.

He may be trying to discredit Ms Lamont in an attempt to limit the damage her revelations have done to the party in Scotland.  According to the latest poll of polls on Scot goes Pop, voting intentions for May 2015 are

SNP 42.0% (+3.2)
Labour 26.1% (+0.3)
Conservatives 16.0% (-3.4)
Liberal Democrats 6.0% (-1.8)
Greens 4.7% (+1.8)
UKIP 3.7% (-1.7)

 This was before Ms Lamont's revelations, so it's not hard to imagine a further slide for Labour in the next series of polls.


It may be a combination of any or all of the above reasons.  Whatever it is, it seems like a clumsy attempt to rewrite history.  I don't think the Ministry of Truth will be calling on his services any time soon.