ANALYSIS: Forget Boris, the name on every Cabinet minister's lips this week is Jeremy Corbyn
2 min read
Wherever Jeremy Corbyn is spending Tory conference week, it's safe to say his ears must be burning.
Because forget Boris Johnson and Jacob Rees-Mogg, the Labour leader is the talk of the conference centre here in Birmingham.
Without fail, the carefully-scripted - and no doubt signed off by Number 10 - speeches of every Cabinet minister have made some reference to Corbyn. And not in a good way.
To Michael Gove, he is "the Moscow-loving, Hamas-hugging, high-taxing, moderate-bashing, job-destroying, National Anthem-avoiding, NATO-hating, class war-provoking, one-man museum of economic folly".
James Brokenshire said "Jeremy Corbyn and the Labour Party may have given the Red Flag a reboot, but it’s the same old socialism that brought our country to its knees".
According to Dominic Raab, Corbyn and John McDonnell are "using all the tools in the extremists’ armoury - intimidation, fanaticism, scapegoating, especially against Jews".
Meanwhile, David Mundell said the Labour leader was willing to trade Scotland for the keys to Number 10, meaning he is "a man that we can never let into Downing Street".
And just now, Sajid Javid ramped up the rhetoric further by accusing Corbyn of being "a threat to our national security".
"If Mr Corbyn were ever to be Prime Minister this behaviour wouldn’t just be naïve, it wouldn’t just be misguided, it would be downright dangerous and it is our duty to stop him," he declared.
Even Boris Johnson has been getting in on the act, telling a packed-out fringe meeting that there is no electoral bounty for the Tories if they simply "ape Corbyn".
If he is sitting on his allotment making a veggie omelette or harvesting some late autumn fruit for his latest batch of homemade jam, the Labour leader can afford a wry chuckle.
Because it seems as though the Conservatives have learned absolutely nothing from their electoral humiliation last year. Surely they must now realise that dressing Corbyn up as some sort of bogey man does not help them in any way. If anything, continually uttering his name simply adds to his appeal among voters who the Conservatives need to win back next time around.
Oscar Wilde said the only thing worse than being talked about was not being talked about. By that token, Jeremy Corbyn is having a very good Tory conference indeed.
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