Deckchairs on the Titanic

First it was Margaret Beckett tipped for a return to the front line, now it is John Prescott. Here’s Martin Bright in the New Statesman.

“There is also talk of the need for a Chris Patten figure to act as cheerleader for the party, as the Tory chairman did in the run-up to the 1992 election to cover for John Major’s inadequacies. More likely will be the emergence of a praetorian guard of seasoned TV and radio performers to protect Brown from the growing hostility of the media.


One figure who may yet make a play for the Patten role is the former deputy party leader John Prescott, who has re-entered the fray as an unlikely blogger on the LabourHome website. His “campaign for a fourth term not a fourth leader” challenges MPs to put an end to the speculation and return to constituency campaigning (his maths isn’t dodgy, by the way; he’s including John Smith in his calculations).