I am very sorry to hear that veteran blogger Tom Harris has decided to stop his blog. Tom has been one of the best bloggers of the left and challenged the more established bloggers on the right such as Iain Dale, Conservative Home etc.

Tom said in his closing post, which you can read here, that it had started to take over his life and that he was becoming known as the blogger who was an MP rather than an MP who also blogged. He also said it was impacting on his personal and family life too. I have some sympathy for what he says. Those of us who chose to blog as a way of communicating can make ourselves vulnerable to attacks from all kinds of people. Sometimes it gets personal and you must be robust enough to not get embroiled, but it isn’t always easy, as Tom has found.

I hope he continues in some format – on Twitter or even facebook perhaps. We need more bloggers like Tom on the left. Indeed this year at Labour Party conference I held a fringe event at which we discussed the issue of left wing bloggers and how to help more emerge. We are getting there but I’m afraid we still have more work to do before we will achieve the same recognition that those on the right do. It won’t be long… nevertheless it is a great shame that Tom Harris will no longer contribute to this cause but I wish him all the best.