If only the Labour Party could take a few lessons from Tony Blair. He understood the importance of encouraging hardworking people. He understood that if Labour was to win it was vital that the party reached across party divides. More importantly, he understood that voters would not vote for him if they were terrified that the Treasury’s sticky fingers would be perpetually dipping into their pockets. And for three elections it worked. After all he learned at the feet of the Mistress, Margaret Thatcher. She was regarded as the cuckoo in the nest, not a ‘true Tory’,but managed to reach across the parties. It started with the right to own a Georgian door and then to buy the council house that families had spent so much on. She brought back pride in council estates and ripped the heart out of an ‘everyone knows their place’ mentality. Most of all she gave everyone from any background the opportunity to improve their lives.

Sadly, like Blair and all great leaders she went a little bonkers.

But Tony Blair has been demonised as a war mongering Tory. He was regarded by the unions and the left as a cuckoo in the nest as well. The S word disappeared from the New Labour vocabulary. And to a certain extent he was throwing out the unelectable chicks from the Labour nest. He was a very effective political cross dresser. Miliband will learn no lessons from him. Someone who should be admired as an election winner is despised as a class traitor.

And there lies the problem. Grass roots Labour are genuinely horrified at the Thornberry tweet. White Van man deserted the Tories for New Labour. And at by elections they have been migrating to the KIPPERS. In many ways that tweet summed up the problems Miliband’s Labour has. A Westminster elite living in two million pound houses and never having to worry overly about paying the mortgage or the bills. It was right that she resigned. But the damage has been done. Not catastrophic but a serious hole beneath the credibility water line. Chris Bryant, who is more politically savvy than he is often given credit, summed it up well, ‘always respect the voters even when you disagree with them’.

The trouble for Thornberry is that although she represents an Islington constituency, it’s not all posh Labour; she has Finsbury which is not lacking in White Van culture. And she has a majority of just over three thousand. It might be time for her to dust down her wig.

What is fascinating about KIPPER support, according YOUGOV, is that most of them are just fed up and would like Britain to return to life as it was thirty years ago. Fire up the Quattro and put a mullet headed Farage at the controls. Except that he won’t be at the controls. He won’t have enough MPs (I don’t think that he will have any) to be propping up a government. What he could achieve is a Miliband government propped up by the SNP. The SNP who don’t give a damn for the UK, only for Scotland. The most terrifying scenario for any democrat.

So that is what Farage can deliver. The end of everything White Van man and the rest of us hold dear.

The next election will about who governs Britain and who can fulfil the aspirations for those who work their guts out and feel unloved.