Jim Pickard

For them to do so well in Wales and Scotland, for them to massacre Labour and the Tories across England, I think...

that is still bigger than the two by-elections.

And I think it's very easy to write off Nigel Farage, and it's very easy to do the old advice about financial investment, which is that past performance is no guide to the future.

I think we've got it so ingrained in our heads that the Tories and Labour take turns governing Britain.

I think some of us are not able to make the mental leap of, well, hang on, they are actually 10 points ahead or 8 points ahead or whatever it is in the polls, and therefore they are still big and tough.

The logic I was picking up from some of his MP supporters was, at the moment he has this energy, this insurgent energy, this energy of coming from the north in order to knock down Keir Starmer.

If you win by a couple of percentage points, whatever it is, and you come down to London and then you twiddle your thumbs...

and you think about the pros and cons of standing against Keir Starmer, your sense of momentum and insertion energy just vaporizes into thin air.

And to me, that's very compelling.

I suppose the other points we haven't made are you need a day or two to talk about make a film, do some speeches and prove that you do care about your new constituency.

But you can get that done in a few days.

There are people out there who are saying he needs to focus on Greater Manchester because one of the conditions of the NEC allowing him to stand in Mayfield was that he did have to get involved in helping with the Greater Manchester campaign.

The problem with that is that if Labour loses in Greater Manchester, then once again, that removes your kind of

sense of urgency and direction and it's no coincidence that there's a lot of Sir Keir Starmer's friends and allies putting around this theory that surely Andy needs to do the Greater Manchester by-election that he caused before he goes on to anything bigger.

It's Starmer's allies who are particularly putting around that theory.

Yeah, I'm sure.

That's why the Stalmer people want to do it.

Stick around and lose it.

Yeah.

And then lose momentum.