WHAT kind of assassination attempt leaves the ‘victim’ healthier than before?
The latest polls suggest the bungled plot to oust Gordon Brown last week has not damaged the government as much as some commentators including me would have guessed.
In fact, Labour have moved up a point.
Why? Well, the very fact the coup was so badly handled, and quickly quashed, has strengthened Mr Brown’s position.
The entire cabinet eventually rallied behind him, making any further ‘assassination’ attempts impossible before the next election.
Secondly, the price of this support appears to have been a significant change in Labour’s economic line going in to the new year.
Chancellor Alistair Darling has been allowed to speak openly, for the first time, of the need for the biggest spending cuts in 20 years.
Previously Mr Brown and key allies, including Ed Balls, had wanted to present the electorate with a choice between ‘Tory cuts’ and ‘Labour investment’.
Rebels have long grumbled that such a position was simply not credible, given the size of the national debt. Some felt it was outright dishonesty.
A fair number will feel the turmoil of last week was worth it to extract such a concession from the prime minister.
Thirdly there is the ‘sympathy factor’.
We’ve seen this before, when Mr Brown was attacked for mis-spelling the name of a dead soldier in a handwritten letter to his family.
Then, much of the criticism was viewed as over-the-top and the prime minister gained, rather than lost, public support.
This time many voters may have felt the rebels had already had a fair chance to get rid of their leader, and that this was a coup too far.
Disloyalty is rarely popular, in any case. And Geoff Hoon and Patricia Hewitt are hardly popular heroes with the country at large.
Salutory lesson for would-be Labour leaders: it isn’t Gordon Brown, specifically, that the country doesn’t seem to love. It’s most of you, and maybe all.
And fourth? The snow. Many people were too busy trying to get on with their daily lives to care about Labour infighting. Simple as that.
One final thing. I owe an apology to Ian Stewart, the MP for Eccles. When news of
the attempted coup broke, I sent a round robin text to Labour MPs in our region asking them to call me with their views.
Ian was the first to ring, the first to attack the plotters and the first to back Mr Brown.
He did so within minutes, where others took far longer.
I quoted him online, but not in the next day’s paper. I am sorry for that.
Ian. whose seat will disappear at the next election. should be praised for having the bottle to speak his mind on a controversial issue without first taking soundings from colleagues.
High-flier returns to haunt his party
BEWARE the bitter man with a book to sell.
Peter Watt, the former general secretary of the Labour party, left under a cloud over the ‘Donorgate’ scandal in 2007.
His new memoirs claim Mr Brown blew £1.2m preparing for a general election that year before pulling out at the last moment, with limousines literally ready to whisk MPs on to the campaign trail.
More damagingly, he says the prime minister had ‘no plan for what to do in government’ and that, under his leadership, Number 10 was ‘a shambles’.
Just as with the abortive putsch, you have to ask questions about Mr Watt’s motivation and timing.
He is only in a position to share such explosive revelations because of his time as general secretary – a post which is all about putting the best interests of the party first.
Even the anti-Brown camp in the Labour party will be shaking their heads at that.
But that is not to say his account isn’t interesting or true.
And the more Labour try to spin away Mr Watt’s account as the rantings of an angry sensationalist, the more it begs the question: So why did you put him in charge?
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I like to think its all part of a Conservative tentacle conspiracy. Trying to oust a prime minister so close to an election raises the eyebrows. And this book has caused my eyebrows to stick to the back of my head. Some ideas could be legitimate but many could well be passed on by a wolf in sheep's clothing.
".... you have to ask questions about Mr Watt’s motivation and timing."
As indeed you do with everyones political jottings David!
Have to object to the use of the word 'assassination' in this article. Was a gun/kife etc used to make an attempt on Mr Browns life? Erm no. More a clumsy attempt by two has-been MPs Quite creative use of the word there even given the inverted comma.
Now lets consider the gun attack on Manchester City player at weekend. Now that was an assassination/murder attempt.
Lets keep it in perspective here Mr Ottewell.
Labour have moved up a point?
We'll see.
brown is the most untouchable leader i have ever seen. no matter how much of a balls up and mess he and his party makes, he still seems to remain in power! his party cannot even get rid of him. he is the most dangerous man in britain today. he has the power to mess things up for decades to come. although his years as chancellor have already done that.
the most similar leader you can compare brown to is robert mugabe, constantly messing up the country and he too wont take the hint and stand down.
I still predict that Brown will not be the leader of the party come the general election. They will still lose no matter who is handed the poison chalice. Hopefully we can them look forward to aperiod of safe, creative and successful Tory government.
Wake up! Labour know they have no chance of winning the next election, I think this was no more than
a shabby plot to get some sympathy for Brown. See how his ministers reacted to the plot, very few of them gave him their open support. Perhaps this is the last throw of the dice for Labour with his desperate friends trying to figure out a way to get a glow of sympathy for the man who was never voted in by the people to be Prime Minister
Smells like the dark lord mandleson spin miester fingerprints. Notice how the challengers are singular or to few to bat an eyelid. Unlike the Tories of thatcher and major years. The best way shake a few feathers in the nest is using the weaker people to bolster moaning mps. As long as manchester people willing and committed to vote nulabor back in then Gordon will survive. Look what Gordon Brown done for the Northwest region. Manchester people willingness to join the Euroland project, Acceptance of Polish, Kurdish, Africans and Asian countries. Happy to accept Illegal immigration policies. A welcome mat for all Asylum seekers. Helping young and old back to work. As proven by the unemployment figures. Putting pressure on local councils to improve community projects. So I say "Lets us manchester people put our full support behind our leader Gordon Brown".
"a period of safe, creative and successful Tory government" Hurry O'Caine - the Irish Whirlind, Typhoon Tipperary. Get real you deluded person.
its quite amusing that one of the headlines of a major newspaper highlights the massive influx of immegrants that have flocked here to drain the benefits system!
duh! i said this two years ago! especially when i told by a fellow polish employee that he could claim for his two children here, even though they where back over in poland! even though he'd only just moved here and didnt have to pay as much tax anyway!
like i've said before! the benefits system needs to be scrapped and replaced with one that only helps those who are willing to get back on their feet.
STEVE SLATER,
In what way am I deluded? The Tories will win the next election and we will have a better government than the current chaotic mess.
The purpose of the supposed coup was to fire a warning shot across Gordon's bow and unnerve him. Although not a fan of Geoff Goon and Patricia Blewitt at least they had the balls to say what a lot of Labour MPs are thinking but not saying. GB is a liability, he's got to go. Hey!! but don't get rid of him yet because all the time we have this blundering incompetent, ineffectual dullard as PM it makes a Tory victory look all the more likely. If you vote for GB and his merry band of Socialists we will have another five years of high taxes, gargantuan public debt, an ailing economy, spiralling crime, more unchecked immigration, prisoners being released early from Prison. We cannot go on like this
This election is a nightmare. No-one in their right mind wants a Tory government at this time, but if the only realistic alternative is allowing Gordon and his corrupt gang of incompetent control freaks back in power, then that's what we'll get.
I could never, ever vote for any party that made it even remotely possible that we would still have Gordon Brown as prime minister in June. All we can realistically hope for is that it's a hung parliament and we get some form of proportional representation as the price for Lib Dem support. Just as long as it's not with Brown as PM...
If Ottewell thinks GB is 'healthy' he needs a good slapping. Dead man walking.
Cosmo
Not sure why you say what you say. After the catastrophe of the Callaghan years (poor man of Europe etc - if you are old enough to remember) the victory of Margaret Thatcher saved the country. You may not like that analysis but it is genrally accepted as true.
So let's all stop playing silly beggars, have an election and vote in the Tories to save our bacon. As you say, the alternative is frightening.