October 7, 2007
It’s off - but are Brown’s problems just beginning?
FIrst off, I was wrong. I couldn’t see how Gordon Brown could back out of a November election without inflicting serious self-harm. It would have been a gamble, but in my view the bigger gamble was to wait, especially since a delay would hand the Tories a propaganda victory and deal his own reputation a heavy blow.
But having cranked up the election hype for weeks (make no mistake, this was not a media creation), Mr Brown’s decision to delay a poll - probably until 2009 - has fundamentally changed the terms of political trade.
The prime minister will be labelled "Bottler Brown", the man who failed to run against Tony Blair for the Labour leadership in 1994, was prepared to wound but not strike Mr Blair when he was PM, who backed out of a promise to hold a referendum on a new EU treaty. Now he is walking away from an election which his own aides had spent the last few weeks talking up.
By contrast David Cameron has been transformed from a political dead man walking - the latest in a line of Tory leaders heading for electoral disaster - into somebody who looks like he could be a winner. The Tories are back in the game.
This whole affair gives the Tories that most valuable of political commodities - momentum. But will there be longer term ramifications for Mr Brown, beyond the humiliation he will face next week when the Commons returns after its summer break?
Long term predictions are pretty pointless. The last few weeks have shown how febrile British public opinion is at the moment, with the polls veering widely from Labour domination to a Tory lead in a matter of days. Small political events can trigger extreme responses from the electorate.
But I think the damage to Mr Brown could outlast the firestorm of the next few days. The Tories have an open goal when it comes to tackling the prime minister’s claim to have risen above squalid party politics - to be some kind of father of the nation: they will say he ran away from an election because of poor opinion polls.
They will also use the episode to attack Mr Brown’s claim to have binned spin. What else has been going on for the last few weeks of election hype? And what about the ill-judged trip to Basra during the Tory conference?
Suddenly the master tactician looks vulnerable. He can bounce back - of course - but this has been a searing episode for the prime minister and his closest advisers. Hubris is the word that springs to mind.
Having now handed the 2009/10 election to the Tories the interesting thing will be whether the wheels come off from Brown’s reckless spending and borrowing as chancellor fast enough for an earlier election. Of course this won’t happen as Brown will now simply cling on as long as he can. When everyone reslises that Blair was in primary school when it comes to spin and cronies compared with Brown I confidently predict that Brown will not have a dissolution honours list either.
Posted by: David Potter | October 7th, 2007 at 9:58 pm | Report this commentOne day Gordon Brown is the genius, the next day he’s the idiot. A few weeks ago David Cameron was dead, then came his fight back and now we look at him as the clear next prime minister. Now Brown is dead….this will go on and on and on.
Gordon is slow - it took him 10 years to become PM - but he reaches what we want. Eventually.
It will be an exciting battle, but Brown is all but dead.
p.s. George, It must be annoying to admit that you got it wrong and Ben Brogan of the Mail got it right.
Posted by: Gino Pino Pilotino | October 8th, 2007 at 10:08 am | Report this commentHow did we end up with an unelected Prime Minister?
Posted by: Stan | October 8th, 2007 at 3:57 pm | Report this commentBrown has no mandate unless he goes to the country - this is a most unsatisfactory situation!