Sometimes, the cruelty is the point!

Communicator of the Week Award goes to Shabana Mahmood (the new Home Secretary), who this week set out the Labour Party's new strategy to tackle the perennial political problem of immigration.

Labour has an identity problem. Its roots are working class. Its heart is progressive. Its head is neo-liberal. And its fear is that it is being outflanked by the far right.

What to do?

Whether the new approach to immigration she announced will work is way above my pay grade (and who the hell knows if we're being honest). But one thing is for sure - she's got everybody talking.

The Conservatives are complimentary but claim that she is stealing their ideas.

The Left are incensed because she is betraying their liberal sympathies.

The Far Right are positively effusive because they sense that they are winning the argument.

And the voters in the middle are just pleased that someone in the government is finally speaking with conviction and taking action (even if they have no idea if that action is right or wrong).

When you want to communicate a controversial message, the single most important element of your communication must be conviction.

You have to say it like you mean it! No puff; no preamble; no prevarication.

You must force people to engage with your message, rather than speculate about your capability.

Certain parts of Mahmood's policy have been described as performative cruelty. Yet, rather than shirking from that harshness, Mahmood has embraced it, even doubled down on it.

It has led to comparisons to Thatcher and speculation about her leadership credentials.

All of that is overblown and I give it a week before the sheen starts to fade. But for now, she is dominating the political narrative, and that's good politics.

Kolarele