This morning I’ve been attempting to uncover the rules governing the selection of Labour Party’s Shadow Cabinet – you know, that thing that David Miliband doesn’t want to be a part of.

Labour has different rules governing its behaviour during periods of opposition and periods of government. When they’re not in Government suddenly things start looking a lot more democratic with elections and the like, while in government they empower the leader to take politically useful shortcuts. Their rules say that in opposition the Shadow Cabinet must be nominated and elected by the MPs, not merely appointed by the Leader.

However, for a vote to be valid, an MP must vote for 6 men and 6 women. Ugh. Here we go again. Labour has no qualms with positive discrimination – consider how successful the tokenisation of Diane Abbott was, how Labour created the illusion that women are TOTALLY allowed to run for the leadership, thus inspiring the next generation of women and girls who look forward to being humiliated themselves one day.

By successful, you should read “abject failure”, obviously.

But then, what did we expect? Not enough MPs actually wanted to nominate Diane to stand – it was only because Labour panicked and decided that getting her on the ballot would be a cheap and easy way of demonstrating their equal rights credentials. Yet it didn’t change the underlying reality: No-one really wanted Diane Abbott because she’s a pompous, passive-agressive arsehole.

Want proof? She whinged to Polly Toynbee during the campaign that the contest was unfairly stacked against her.  David Miliband’s campaign had hundreds of thousands of pounds and a team of over 90 people, whilst hers had 2 and a half people and £1,700. This, she says, is a failure of the rules to level the playing field. Wouldn’t it have been fairer for the party to fund their campaigns, perhaps, and provide the volunteers, perhaps, so that she wouldn’t disadvantaged by the fact that people didn’t actually want her to be leader?

What a role model! What a superstar!

Far from providing a shining beacon of ‘what’s possible’, Diane was turned into a freak show and a warning. She was given a leg up through tokenism and that’s all her candidacy was ever seen as. It made things worse.

Still, no-one ever accused Labour of learning from their mistakes. Another contest, another chance to prove how “equal” they really (really) think women are.