Labour Party leadership candidate John McDonnell says he's within striking distance of getting his name on the leadership ballot.

A full and rowdy house of trade union activists has rolled up for this evening's John4Leader public campaign event in Euston. The attendees are not all geriatric either: the youth wing of the Labour left is a noticeable force now at many McDonnell events.

The star turn appears on excellent form, not least because the government isn't. Lord Levy has just been chucked in the jug again, and McDonnell tells his very enthusiastic audience that the word - and the hope - on the ground is that one A C L Blair might not be too far behind.

'I think there is a prospect that the Blair government will unravel very quickly now,' McDonnell says with no small pleasure, as he outlines the many encouraging potentials offered by Levy's second exit with the fuzz. 'Things could speed up [with the investigation] even over the next few days.'

If they do, McDonnell says, he and the large number of union members, young activists, reinvigorated leftwing Labour party members and everyday punters who are turning out to these meetings up and down the country will take the opportunity to tell the voting public all about the real traitors to the Labour party.

'We need to explain to people that they [the Blairites and Brownites] are not the Labour party,' McDonnell smiles, possibly in response to critics who stridently observe that McDonnell himself has a loyalty problem, because of his ongoing refusal to toe the party (Blairite) line. 'They are the parasites,' McDonnell says.

Indeed, McDonnell seems to be feeling so confident that people will see that point that he is almost happy - which he has not been - to publicly indicate the number of MPs that are prepared to support his leadership bid (he needs the support of 44 MPs to get his name on the leadership ballot paper).

'My view is that we are over the halfway mark,' he says. He says he thinks there are about 15 to 20 to go. He says again that a key part of making up those 15 or 20 minds will be 'how this police thing (Levy's arrest and the investigation into Number 10's unusual email arrangements) unravels. We need to give confidence to those 15 or 20 MPs. We are within striking distance of getting on the ballot paper. That will shock them.'

McDonnell also says he is fairly sure he has the support of Constituency Labour Party groups - such as they are in these times of tiny membership - and 'the majority of organised support in the trade unions.' The problem, he says, remains the Parliamentary Labour Party, which continues to refuse to wake up to the fact that it's dead.

Ditto, McDonnell says, for the union dinosaurs who are still trying to sell the idea that union members have or are benefiting from affiliated union links with New Labour. He holds up a the latest issue of Unison's Labour Link magazine, to show the crowd a photo which features every Labour party leader and deputy-leader candidate, except McDonnell. 'Isn't it amazing?' McDonnell grins. 'Everyone [in the photo] has voted for anti-union policy,' and yet here they are, held up by Unison as the only, and glowing, examples of a beautfiully-functioning trade union-Labour party relationship.

McDonnell says he amazed that the big four unions still seem to think they will be able to negotiate with Gordon Brown. 'What for - a Warwick [Agreement] Two? That's great, isn't it - the concept of having a Warwick Two that builds on the non-implementation of Warwick One? Dont you find that amazing?' McDonnell asks the crowd again.

'No,' several members of it say.

30 January 2007