On Sunday, Shami Chakrabarti was forced to use an appearance on Peston on Sunday to claim that she was not a hypocrite after the topic of grammar schools was raised. The issue? Although the shadow attorney general is vocal in her opposition to selective education in the state, she sent her own son to a selective fee-paying school.
https://twitter.com/pestononsunday/status/785053732497006593
While Chakrabarti insists that buying choice for herself while denying people without money the same option does not make her a hypocrite -- explaining that as she is rich she is able to live a ‘charmed and privileged life’ -- she is just one of a number of shadow cabinet members who complicate Labour's opposition to grammar schools. It so happens that the new shadow home secretary Diane Abbott also sent her son to a private school. Meanwhile, shadow foreign secretary Emily Thornberry sent her children to a... selective state school 14 miles from her home.
Mr S suspects it's for the best if Jeremy Corbyn's three top comrades stay away from PMQs the next time he goes on the attack over selective education. After all they wouldn't want to be accused of double standards...