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Thursday 4 December 2008

Gordon Brown will lose his lustre

Don’t go greener or get meaner, Mr Cameron

Key insights from the top American pollster

‘Give the man a chance,’ was the refrain I heard over and over again. And, ‘Well, he’s not Tony Blair.’ Suddenly, David Cameron wasn’t the only British leader offering an antidote to Blairism. For two years Conservatives had assumed that ‘change’ was a political weapon uniquely theirs. Yet in less than 100 days Gordon Brown — the Labour Prime Minister — seems to have turned this logic on its head. Thanks to the fragmenting of the British electorate, it is certainly possible to be a part of an unpopular and unwanted government, as Brown clearly was, and yet still be seen as distinct and separate — as Brown has clearly become.

It is quite remarkable that Gordon Brown owes his current popularity in great measure to the unpopularity of his predecessor, and to the universal cynicism of the British people that same predecessor inspired. My firm has polled and researched in two dozen countries over the past three years, and nowhere on the globe is the level of distrust of elites and the institutions they manage so deep, so pervasive and — it has to be said — so depressing. Everything is ‘spin’, and everyone is a ‘spin doctor’.

Now enter Gordon Brown, a man who appears so dull and boring to the British electorate that in his persona spin goes to die. Nearly 100 days into his government, voters still have trouble identifying anything specific about him other than his demeanour — and that’s exactly why he would win at the ballot box if a snap election were called today.

Back in May, I suggested in a Guardian opinion piece that Brown needed ‘to accept who he is and what he represents and turn those attributes into strengths.’ I even had the audacity to put carefully crafted words in his mouth: ‘Some people say I’m boring. Well, they’re right. In challenging times such as these, Britain doesn’t need an entertainer. We need a leader.’ And that is exactly what he has become. A terrorist attack hours into his reign, historic floods weeks later, foot-and-mouth after that — a string of government crises that have bestowed upon him the mantle of leader. Boring, perhaps, but a leader nevertheless.

While the British electorate has witnessed Brown’s firm hand on the tiller, David Cameron has sailed into choppier waters. Twin by-election failures, an ill-timed trip to Rwanda, and highly publicised in-fighting over modernisation and policy have made the Conservatives look more like Kinnock’s Labour party than the 21st-century political machine Cameron has sought to create. Now, contrast that with the Prime Minister’s robust tackling of terrorists and the unions. He even managed to take tea with Margaret Thatcher. Like him or not, Brown has taken firm control of difficult events seemingly beyond his control.

More articles from: Frank Luntz | this section

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