Why the rush?

It’s crushingly stupid that Labour leadership nominations are going to open (next Monday) and close (next Thursday) so quickly.

The great advantage of having a more drawn-out contest – it’ll go on until September – is that the party has more time to think about its defeat and suss out the contours of the new government. But forcing would-be candidates to decide and gather all their nominations so ridiculously quickly means that MPs, many of whom are new, have to do all this taking stock in just a week. Daft. Pointless.

We need to figure out where we want to go from here, and that’s a more basic question than who we want to take us there.

Update: They've extended the deadline. Good.