Oh joy. The six remaining members of Labour’s Bristol West Constituency Party have selected Paul “Supergrass” Smith as their candidate for the next general election.
Alderman – as the insufferable little git likes to be addressed – Paul used to be a city councillor for Whitchurch Park before bailing out in 1999 to concentrate full-time on networking his way to a top salary in the Bristol voluntary sector and chairing the Bristol Labour Party.
Unfortunately his attempts there to develop a reputation as a Peter Mandelson-style fixer have been somewhat undermined by the fact that the local party has been in virtual free-fall for the whole of his tenure. This once powerful institution is now just a rump of the morally retarded, the terminally inept and the desperately ambitious fronted by, er… Alderman Paul!
Smith will be fighting the recently redrawn Bristol West constituency, which now includes the Ashley, Easton and Lawrence Hill wards but has lost Stoke Bishop, Westbury-on-Trym and Henleaze to Bristol North West. Experts suggest that the seat will therefore be a straight (in one sense only) battle between the sitting Lib Dem MP Stephen Williams and the New Labour enthusiast.
Smith is still less than fondly known in his former stamping ground of South Bristol as “supergrass”. He developed the name after a series of lengthy “discussions” with the Old Bill following the Harcliffe riots in the summer of 1992. His efforts to get the people of Hartcliffe to grass up their neighbours are similarly still recalled by many.
Smith received the Bristol West nomination after beating three black men. “Not the first time he’ll have done that,” one insider told The Blogger.