Islington councillor Sheila Chapman

ANYBODY wanting to be the Labour candidate in Islington North has to be quick – the deadline is Monday.
But even with a fast-track process, there has been non-stop speculation about who will have put their names forward before the end of the weekend.

The constituency has always been gossiped about in terms of an AC age – After Corbyn – and the likely queue around the block that would emerge if the vacancy ever came up. But this was on the basis that the MP would one day happily retire, rather than being forced out – and things are a little more complicated than long-term speculators had once envisaged.

Cllr will she won’t she

WE tried but failed in attempts to get a response from Islington councillor Sheila Chapman as party insiders suggested that she was considering her options. From the loud whispers, there is certainly a body of feeling that this process should not be left to middle-aged men – and that if Islington North is going to have a new MP then isn’t it time for a woman to be selected? London Assembly member Sem Moema is also said to be considering a run.

Mr Transport

CHRISTIAN Wolmar, whose website modestly bills him as “Britain’s leading transport commentator”, has lived in Islington for donkeys years. He said that his deposit-losing result in a parliamentary by-election in Richmond Park in 2016 should be dismissed as a different set of circumstances – people voted Lib Dem against the Tories – and he’d been waiting for his home constituency to one day come up. He says he is the “media savvy” candidate the party needs.

Him off Newsnight

NO surprises that Paul Mason was the first to declare when the doors opened this week on the selection process. The former Newsnight journalist will want to avoid another near miss in his attempts to become a Labour parliamentary candidate. There have already been a few. He said: “It’s an entirely legitimate thing for someone who’s been in public life to say here are places I’m connected to, here are my talents, are you interested in me using my voice?”

The quiet man

WHILE he has suggested news stories for the Tribune and asked to write opinion pieces over the past few months, Labour councillor Praful Nargund has spent the same time period clamming up whenever our reporters have asked him about the neverending speculation that he was preparing a bid for the candidacy. Messages went unanswered on the subject, phone calls not returned – he’ll have to speak up a little more if he wants to be an MP.