No idea. Apart from his nasal tone which was a little off putting he never made much of an impression either in government or opposition. What has he done to gain your trust?

The way he campaigned on behalf of the hillsborough families in particular certainly made an impression on me eo.

It isn't in the least how I judge him. I made the point that this was the one thing which came to mind. I'm a great believer in the concept that parliament is the meeting place for 650 people who represent the interests of their individual constituencies and I've always voted on the basis of who I think is the best person standing in my constituency.

You can't get away from the evidence though. Our system becomes ever more Presidential and one of the reasons a perfectly decent man in Ed Milliband didn't connect with the public is they just didn't see him as a high office let alone the highest office kind of person.

Which is what concerns me about Burnham. He may well be a very decent man but is he a leader of men and women? Is he someone the country will believe in? You may say we don't know and to some extent that may be true but the harsh truth is that in 15 years in parliament he has risen without trace. He has neither held a great office of state nor been a shadow for a great office of state. That suggests to me that amongst his peers he is seen as a safe pair of hands but not a big hitter.

He ay be the best of those being touted. I don't know but I'm not at all convinced he's good enough or that the country will think him so. Maybe he's Milliband without the charisma.

something in the wood shed

It's like Tinker, Tailor Soldier, Spy sometimes in here. Is that a code?

If he had been chivalrous and held her hand, he would of course have been accused of sexism.

if all he's done is had a load of drugs and sex in Ibiza he's like a typical brit - but show the deluded public their true selves and they'd burn you at the stake.

Not good :

Chuka Umunna, a rising star of the shadow Cabinet, faces embarrassment after it emerged he received a £20,000 gift from an emeritus gambling executive at the same time as campaigning against the proliferation of betting shops in his constituency.

Mr Umunna, who is widely regarded as a future Labour leader, accepted the donation from Neil Goulden, the chairman emeritus of the Gala C*ral Group, which owns more than 1,700 bookmakers.

The shadow Business Secretary was accused of hypocrisy by the Tories for accepting the money. They pointed out he recently ran a campaign in his south London seat of Streatham in which he promised “new powers to control the number of betting shops”.

Mr Goulden spent 10 years as managing director, chief executive and chairman of Gala Coral and still acts as a consultant to the group.

Mr Umunna registered the gift last month and said he would use it to support his office and contribute towards staff costs.

A spokesman said: “This donation was made by an individual Labour Party supporter in a personal capacity and was accepted in accordance with the rules and properly declared.”

Mr Umunna, who is a close ally of Ed Miliband, has faced a series of controversies in recent months which supporters blame Conservative headquarters for generating.

They include the disclosure that in 2006 he protested that some London nightspots “seem to be full of trash and C-list wannabes”. Days later his office was accused of adding comparisons with Barack Obama to his Wikipedia entry.

There's not one potential winner amongst the candidates so far declared.Labour look to be in real trouble and maybe there's no future for the party in which case it may as well just fold. Wonder if they'll consider begging Blair to come back.

Could it be that he is too young and does not want to be like William Hague?

Caroline Flint standing for deputy leader..


so we've had an Ed Stone, we could soon have a Flint Stone?

Course you could ,well his eyes and his teeth.