Who will be the top performer on Question Time?

By Mark Ferguson / @markfergusonuk

Tonight brings the Labour leadership hustings odyssey to an end. Lasting nearly four months, and covering (pretty much) every part of the country (although mostly London), the final event will be a strange one for the candidates – it’s perhaps the most high profile event of the campaign so far, and should have higher viewing figures than the Sky, Channel 4 and Newsnight hustings that have gone before – but there’s almost a sense that the race is winding down now. The vast majority of members will have decided who they are voting for, and most will have voted. If anything this is a pitch to the millions of trade union voters.

The most important thing to remember when consider Question Time is that it isn’t a hustings, at least not in the traditional sense. The most important thing for a guest on Question Time is to get the audience behind them, to bring out lines that will get a positive reaction from (at least sections of) the audience and to claim the applause. Usually applause is won by the guest that is the most combative, or adopts the most oppositionalist position on the panel. By placing yourself in opposition to the received wisdom of the other panelists, who all appear to agree and ape each other’s responses, you can score some big hits.

For me, the person best suited to this format is clearly Diane Abbott, both politically and personally. She stands in clear opposition to the four former cabinet minister on many of the major issues of the past decade, she is personally combative and has shown a real ability to win cheers and applause in hustings before. Diane’s style in hustings – warm but barbed, combative but open – seems perfectly suited to tonight’s event.

However, if I were Diane, I wouldn’t try to be too combative this evening. It is almost impossible for her to win the contest (especially with only 11 MPs behind her), but she can still have a role to play in the shadow cabinet if she shows that she’s a team player, that criticism can be constructive and that we’re all batting for the same team. If she does that tonight (which she’s shown she can throughout the contest) then Diane should do well in the shadow cabinet elections. If she goes on the offensive and tries to score some serious hits tonight, then I’m afraid she may do herself more harm than good in the eyes of many fellow MPs. After so many excellent performances in hustings, that would be a real shame.

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