Political hairwatching

Hadley Freeman in The Guardian writes entertainingly about the hair-dos of New Labour women:

"As the fascination with the rate at which Tony Blair's once youthfully auburn locks have morphed to a beleaguered grey proves, much can be discerned about a government from the state of its hair. But the fuss over Blair's disinterest in the Just for Men section of his local Boots is a distraction from a more intriguing tonsorial matter: the New Labour woman's haircut. Cropped, shapeless as a deflated balloon and topped with willy-nilly tufty bits - like a monk's pudding-bowl style, it immediately identifies her profession and, with its uniformity, gives the group as a whole an oddly cult-like appearance. Tessa Jowell, Ruth Kelly, Hilary Armstrong, Margaret Hodge and Patricia Hewitt all model it, if not marvellously, then certainly thoroughly.
...
This is not another mere sneer at the appearance of women in the public eye. Well, OK then, yes it is. In these politically spun, image-obsessed days, a politician's physical appearance is very telling about a party. The NLD [New Labour Do] is a neat indication of how New Labour's similarities to the Tories of old do not stop at their partiality to secret loans behind the bike sheds. True, it is a move on from the old Tory Helmet Hair, memorably modelled by Margaret Thatcher and, proving that Thatcher's ghost will never slip away, still seen on older female members of the Conservative party, such as Theresa May. Yet the NLD is still an unflattering uniform, and therein, political hairwatchers, lies the probable point."

Now, if you think that I would dare to comment on the hair-dos of certain female Scottish Labour politicians, you are very much mistaken.