There was a headline in one of the papers on Monday advertising a strange job. “Wanted: self-starter to climb 3,000ft every day.” The role involves scaling, daily, the summit of the treacherous Helvellyn in the Lake District to report on weather conditions and the successful applicant will be paid between £21,394 and £25,240. Oh, and it’s just a winter job, from December to April.
I was trying to think of a worse way to make a living than being a “fell top assessor” when I saw another headline: “Labour plunges into civil war rival factions grappling for control of party”.
Can there be any task less appealing at the moment than taking on the Scottish Labour leadership in the wake of Johann Lamont’s departure? Even the generous salary and perks could not compensate for the guaranteed backstabbing and character assassination that will accompany the position. It is a career-ending risk and should come with a health warning.
Surely it’s not a question of who could take on the challenge but who would want to. But politics is a skin-thickening business and there is never a shortage of people prepared to put themselves forward for a kicking.
Whoever is announced as the new leader on December 13 will face opposition on three fronts: from sidelined Scottish MSPs; from Scottish Labour MPs who think they should be running the party; and from the Westminster elite who have a general election to win. And that’s before, of course, the official opponents (SNP) are factored in.
The party’s infighting has, if not brought it to its knees, seriously undermined its appeal to Scottish voters, who have deserted in droves to the SNP. Not just in the referendum, when Labour lost many of its traditional supporters, but in the 2011 Scottish election when it was trounced by the nationalists, the party has struggled to find a focus.
The suggestion that Scottish Labour’s problems are caused by London bullies, though, is rubbish. Lamont’s fiercest critics may have been in Westminster but they were still Scottish. There are 41 Labour MPs representing Scottish seats and Scots still carry disproportionate clout in the UK party.
If Ed Miliband panicked and gave his Scottish leader the final push it is because he feared for those crucial constituencies north of the border that he needs to fulfil his prime ministerial hopes.
The fact that he is probably a bigger liability than Ms Lamont won’t have occurred to him, but now she has gone and his own survival will depend, partly at least, on another Scot.
Who will it be?
There are signs of talent in the new generation of MSPs and both Kezia Dugdale’s and Jenny Marra’s names keep cropping up. But they are untested and the circumstances call for experience. There is plenty of that among the Scottish Labour cohort at Westminster.
Gordon Brown, credited with saving the union, is talked about as a “unity” candidate (even he might laugh at that) who could bring the fractious factions of the party together. But he would be a short-term fix and the party needs something someone – more stable. Besides, he has made it clear he doesn’t want the job.
The other so-called star of the referendum was the East Renfrewshire MP Jim Murphy and he is young enough, at 47, to consider abandoning his Westminster ambitions, temporarily, for a stint in Scotland.
The more Labour looks like losing in May, the more attractive this option becomes, obviously.
But are we not forgetting someone? If Brown and Murphy added oomph to the latter stages of the No campaign, it was Alistair Darling who saw it through from beginning to end.
He would no doubt be horrified by the prospect of a Holyrood job offer and it is hard to picture the urbane former Chancellor in that chamber.
But he is widely respected, unflappable, and has steered Britain through bigger crises than the one currently facing the Labour Party. And he would make Nicola Sturgeon and her team look parochial.
But why would he take on such a thankless chore? Why indeed would any of those other Labour grandees Lord Reid, Lord Robertson return to the fray?
The mountain is too high and the drop too dangerous.