This is the fourth in our series of posts looking at where it all went wrong for Gordon Brown. The first, second and third are here, here and here, respectively.
When did it all go wrong for Gordon? Before he even began, I now think: on the evening of 16 May, 2007, to be precise. It was then that Brown finally secured the backing of 308 Labour MPs – accounts differ as to whether it was Andrew Mackinlay or Tony Wright who pushed him over the finishing line – thus ensuring that he could not be beaten in a leadership contest. Mr Brown was not to become Prime Minister until June 27, but his coronation was ensured that night.
At the time, it was orthodox to say that a Labour contest was pointless – Gordon was bound to win – and would be counter-productive, sparking a wholly unnecessary civil war. This was not a view I shared. It seemed to me then, and seems to me now, that Brown badly needed the legitimacy that a full, transparent contest would confer. After 13 years under the same man’s captaincy, Labour needed to debate its future trajectory, its mission as a governing party. Yet the whole thing was, quite unashamedly, treated as huge stitch-up. There was always something deplorable about the suggestion that the Prime Minister’s job was a private asset to be haggled over between Tony and Gordon. And yet that is precisely what it was between 1997 and 2007, as the two men haggled over Blair’s departure date and Brown’s rightful inheritance.
Stephen Carter, Mr Brown’s shrewd chief strategist, tells colleagues that Mr Brown’s core problem is that – having been crowned, rather than elected – he lacks an “emotional contract” with the public. That is spot on. That problem was compounded horribly in the autumn when the PM toyed embarrassingly with the idea of holding a general election, backing down at the last moment. He then insulted the nation’s intelligence by claiming that his decision had nothing to do with the opinion polls.
All this has come to matter more and more as the months have passed. Initially, the PM was protected by the sense of intriguing novelty that cloaked his regime and by his steady management of terror attacks, the floods and other emergencies: he was not Blair, and, initially at least, he looked steady and reliable. But a man without a mandate takes a terrible risk when things turn sour, as they have. And now, a year into his premiership, Mr Brown looks like a jaded impostor who dithers and rages when he should be leading.
Be in no doubt, however: this is Labour’s fault, not Gordon’s. The party should have insisted on a leadership battle and instead it took the path of least resistance. The result is that the party is heading for defeat and a civil war that will make anything that might have happened last year look like a picnic. In politics, as in life, you reap what you sow.
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