Mandelson’s astonishing return

Peter Mandelson’s return to Government is arguably the most astonishing single event of the New Labour era. His 14 year feud with Gordon Brown has led both men to say the most vituperative things about each other in private: their once strong friendship seemed completely beyond repair and the virulence of their hatred for one another was a source of huge instability during the Blair years. It is only two years since Mandelson was openly questioning Brown’s abilities to lead the party at the 2006 Labour conference in Manchester. I would call this a Molotov-Ribbentrop pact, except that the comparison does not do justice to the breathtakingly counter-intuitive character of this new alliance. It shows that Mandelson is, in the end, a Labour man to his finger-tips, truly the grandson of Herbert Morrison. It shows how badly Brown still wants to win. Watch this space.