Gordon brown

Andrew Marr asking Gordon Brown if he was on anti-depressants was a real surprise. When I first heard that Marr had put this question to Brown, I thought there was a possibility that Labour aides had let it be known that the Prime Minister would like the chance to shoot down these rumours. But Brown’s reaction, suggests he wasn’t expecting the question. One can see why Marr asked the question: if Brown was on anti-depressants that could affect his judgement then the public has a right to know. It wasn’t in the public interest, as Andrew Marr seemed to acknowledge in his interview with George Osborne, that the BBC sat

Today’s papers give us an idea of what Labour’s new dividing line with the Tories is going to be. Labour will find money for eye-catching but not too costly initiatives such as the cancer pledge that the papers have reported on this morning. These pledges will be financed by taking money from the less sexy parts of departmental budgets. Labour will then ask, as Pete noted Ed Balls doing today, how the Tories can match this spending when they are committed to paying down the deficit faster than the government and to reversing several of Labour’s tax rises. If the Tories won’t commit to matching these new pledges, we can expect Labour ministers

It’s the question that won’t go away for Gordon Brown: should he – will he –  take part in a televised leaders’ debate?  On this weekend’s Straight Talk, Andrew Neil takes the opportunity to quiz Ben Bradshaw about his views on the matter.  Here’s how the Culture Secretary responds: “I don’t think [Brown]’s got anything to lose by doing that ….  My advice to him would say, I think you’ve got the arguments, you’ve made the right decisions, you could demolish that guy.” Like Mandelson’s interventions before now, Bradshaw’s advice will slightly raise the pressure on Brown to take part in a debate.  But the first half of it also

The news that Max Clifford is now involved in publicising the story of Baroness Scotland and the illegal cleaner is another blow to an already bruised Labour party. One of the last things that it needs is the beginning of its conference being overshadowed by a story that combines the two toxic issues of political hypocrisy and immigration violations. (There’s also talk that the Telegraph has more expenses revelations and that they will publish them in the next day or so) But I suspect that the bigger problem for Labour, and why it won’t recover from its current dire position, is summed up by these sentences in Mehdi Hasan and

Gordon Brown is expected to offer to decommission one of Britain’s four Trident submarines as part of nuclear non-proliferation discussions at the UN today. The Times has the details: ‘Mr Brown will signal tomorrow that he is ready to negotiate at a meeting of the UN Security Council on nuclear non-proliferation. It follows President Obama’s decision to ditch the US missile defence shield in Eastern Europe. That move, and Russia’s delighted response, has bolstered hopes that a new non-proliferation treaty could be agreed next spring. Officials travelling with the Prime Minister to New York insisted that there was no question of surrendering Britain’s independent nuclear deterrent. They claimed that current

The new ICM poll for The Guardian shows the Tories in an extremely strong position heading into conference season. They are on 43 percent, 17 points ahead of Labour. The extent of Labour’s fall since the last election is illustrated by the fact that only 47 percent of those who voted for the party then intend to do so again. Indeed, even 40 percent of those who have remained loyal to Labour now expect a Tory victory at the next election. The poll also shows that Labour is not seen as credible on the state of the public finances by the electorate. Only 14 percent of voters believe that Labour is