The Tories, Reform and the right wing media get into a lather over Labradors

Speaking at the meeting, Jenny Riddell-Carpenter – yes, the Jenny Riddell-Carpenter, the nature minister! – talked about the need to paint a picture of a modern rural Britain rather than let it be defined nostalgically by those on the right.

“I do believe that the next election is going to be fought on a battle line of nature and rural affairs,” she said. “And there’ll be the far right deciding and determining what that looks like. It’ll be a vision, a nostalgic vision of a Britain that never really existed.

“It’ll be that warm ale, a black Labrador by your feet in a pub that doesn’t exist, and with symbolism of fox hunting all around them. It’ll be a very far right nostalgic vision of Britain that we don’t want to have, [that] never really existed.”

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Oh-oh! Because the right then attacked, with up-and-coming Daily Telegraph rentagob Annabel Denham, a former Tory staffer, claiming that Labour had declared that “a pint in an English pub with the dog dozing at our heels” was “evidence of incipient fascism”.

“Riddell-Carpenter argues this mythical England should give way to a ‘progressive vision of the countryside’ – which presumably means pylons, solar farms and identikit housing developments,” fumed the former director of communications at the Institute of Economic Affairs, the right wing think tank which still insists Liz Truss was right about everything. “Pride banners and Palestine action groups in every village.”

GB News, for their part, were quick to quote James Price, research fellow at the Centre for Policy Studies and another former Tory staffer as well as “a former UK Kebab of the Year Award judge”. He was similarly enraged at the claim owning a Labrador was basically akin to goose-stepping into the Sudetenland.

“The Labour Party really, really hates this country,” he spluttered. “Everything you care about is far right or racist or never existed, apparently. Never ever forget that they hate you and they hate this country.”

Meanwhile, actual senior political figures waded in, led by, inevitably, Nigel Farage, who was quick to post a picture of himself on Instagram sat on a bench with a black Labrador. “A Labour minister described pubs and black labradors as a ‘far right fantasy’,” he wrote. “What a load of rubbish.”

Farage was followed by Conservative Party chairman Kevin Hollinrake who, days away from the opening of his own party’s conference, one might think had better things to do. He posted a picture of himself on X having a pint with a Labrador, writing: “Living the dream.”

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Then – hypocrisy! As both the Daily Mail and Sun revealed that, while claiming the beloved dog breed was basically Oswald Mosley, Riddell-Carpenter had herself posted pictures in the countryside, “including of a black Labrador”.

“This is the very lifestyle it seems the Suffolk Coastal MP, 40, used to enjoy, with a string of social media posts showing her relaxing at the pub and with a black Labrador,” revealed the Mail in a story which required two senior members of its political team to write, the same as Watergate. “In one post, from 2015, which shows a dog sitting in front of a fireplace, she wrote: ‘This is what Sunday breaktime looks like.’”

Now Riddell-Carpenter has finally responded, posting a picture of herself with a dog on Instagram, alongside the message: “I was talking about how rural life isn’t always rosy and there are challenges government can help fix. And how our progressive Labour vision under this government will bring more opportunity for everyone in rural Britain.

“And this is my lovely dog, Pepe.”

All much more important than anything the prime minister had to say on Tuesday, then!