It's a great pity that people who decide to devote their time to serving in public life fall by the wayside like this. The burden of carrying Glasgow City Council and the Labour Party on your shoulders must be an immense task, particularly for one so young.
I was discussing with a friend recently how Scottish politics has simply boiled down to this macabre game between politicians and journalists, where the journalists intrinsically do not believe the politicians are of a calibre that the title has traditionally merited, and politicians in a desperate attempt to appear capable, strive to come up with more and more ludicrous 'visions' to ensure press coverage and their justification for the use of the title.
Naturally this leads to the question of why otherwise sensible people get into politics. There are very few, from any party, that I've met, that do not work more than 39 hours a week. Family life and personal life are put on hold, whilst the politician puts their all into, what is in essence a very stressful popularity contest, where, increasingly, adherence to party dogma is of paramount importance.
I suppose politics has really moved away from discussion about the principles and theories best suited to good governance, to capitalising on attracting those stirred enough from the general malaise and apathy of the electorate, to actually get to the polling station and put their X against the candidate they feel best represents them.
As to Stephen Purcell's 'resignation', as the leading light of the Scottish Labour party machine, I imagine the only Labour politician in Scotland who will benefit from his removal from the spotlight is none other than the Secretary for the State of Scotland, and future leader of the Labour Party in Holyrood, the not so shifty Jim Murphy MP.
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Well just when it looked all dignified and a done deal, the rumour mill goes into full effect, aided of course by the news that Councillor Purcell has engaged the legendary Scottish PR guru Jack Irvine of Media House to handle all press enquiries for him. A pricey ticket no doubt.
The latest sniff is that a former chief executive of a certain Labour laden quango did not go gently into the night, preferring to toot in his tuppence that stress is one of the symptoms of the modern age and hard put upon executives have to resort to all sorts of aides to get them through the night.
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