Another bad start to the week for Brown
Peter Hoskin 8:59am
It's not a great start to the week for Gordon Brown, as he prepares for relaunch no.29. After the pummelling he received from John Prescott, Cherie Blair and Stephen Byers over the weekend, more (former) Blairites have entered the fray. Foremost among them is Lord Levy, who's conducted a series of interviews to hawk his new book. Here's what he had to tell the Telegraph, when asked whether Brown should resign:
“You don't really need to ask me that question ... you need to look at the polls and see what the public believes and feels. I am actually stunned at what the polls are showing.
That's a question that Gordon really needs to reflect on, his Cabinet need to reflect on and the Labour Party hierarchy and members of the Commons need to reflect on. But the polls certainly are not looking very pretty, to put it mildly.”
However, two anonymous quotes from the same article are more arresting. One “leading Blairite” reveals that Blair can “not stop laughing” about Brown's plight, and another says: “Brown has not got a hope in hell of winning the next election, the focus now should be on ensuring the party isn't wiped out for the next decade.”
All of which reinforces the idea that the Brown premiership is becoming a feeding-frenzy. I doubt the parallels with the Major years will be lost on the electorate.
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Comments
Ray
May 12th, 2008 11:13amI would image John Major is also nowadays given to the odd wry smile too.
bt
May 12th, 2008 11:17amDoes anyone expect it to get better? Nope.
Unless there's a miraculous intervention the writing is on the bunker wall. (As an aside - there have been a number of spoofs on YouTube of 'The Bunker', with Adolf raving about how everyone has let him down. I'm amazed that so far a Brownian version hasn't turned up.)
Brown will go - and quite soon, probably of his own volition. He's a proud man but brittle, and the possibility of being forced out would be too personally devastating for him to contemplate.
The idea that it benefits the tories to keep him twisting in the wind for the next two years is a big mistake IMO. What happens to the country, the economy while they play games for political advantage? Force an election asap, they'll win and who needs a majority of 100+ anyway?
John
May 12th, 2008 11:45amThis is many orders of magnitude worse than the Major years. Major won an election. MacBean could not win an election unopposed. Major was in office for several years. MacBean is hanging on by his fingernails after less than a year.
Max Kaye
May 12th, 2008 6:55pmJohn, what fingernails?