Angela Rayner, deputy leader of Labour, called Tories "scum". Now half the scum in Britain are distracting attention from their policies of cruelty by rebuking her crude language.

What Rayner said was totally justified, but the way Aneurin Bevan (also working class) said it was more effective and harder to attack superficially: "The Tories are lower than vermin." Be using a less common word to condemn them, and putting it inside a comparison, he made it sound incisive rather than crude.

Rayner should not even hint at apologizing, but rather than defending her insult, she should press the attack with varieties of brief but substantial condemnations.