Brown Calls It! Election is OFF

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8th October, 2007

THE FERALS ARE AFTER BROWN NOW

What’s with Harriett Harman’s reaction to Brown’s unfortunate call? Asked if Brown was damaged by this, she denied nothing, but said, rather hesitantly, “well, we’ll see”.

GOD! I thought YOU were on HIS side, Ms Harman? Not after another leader’s head, are you? Time for a woman at the top, hmm?
The Times muses over Brown’s (in)decision

A Hung Parliamentarian?

Above – poll projections as in News of The World: Click for poll results in detail

Sunday Telegraph excerpt:

The News of The World result was the best of the weekend’s three polls for the Conservatives and the worst for Labour. But after his conference speech, all three had Cameron ahead of Brown, a complete turnaround from recent weeks.

An ICM poll of marginal seats out today in the News of the World puts the Tories on 44 per cent, six points ahead of Labour’s 38 per cent and enough to see Labour lose its overall majority if repeated in a general election.

In a further blow for Mr Brown, a new nationwide poll by YouGov for the Sunday Times shows the Conservatives turning a six-point deficit into a three-point lead over Labour – by 41 per cent to 38 per cent.

Another poll, for the Mail on Sunday, gave the Tories a one-point lead, on 39 per cent.

See the Telegraph’s full report here

Read the BBC run-down of the Sundays’ take on this.

 

If this HAD happened in the marginals, Brown’s Labour government would be working with the Lib Dems in a month’s time. The other two polls showed Labour neck and neck with the Tories. Interesting how the Lib Dems might have ended up being the power brokers, when their poll ratings have actually dropped. Mr Brown is keen to work with ALL people of talent and ideas; but not to get into bed with them! He well recalls Tony & Paddy’s “love that dare not speak its name”, (1994 – 1997 over possible coalition/merger), whose ardour he and Prescott combined successfully to extinguish.

 

It seems THAT Labour leader meant what he said about working closely with others.

Still, a week’s a long time …

Wonder what next week will bring!

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We know what all of our press think of Brown’s on-off election games, so I thought I might add a link or two from other places. Here’s one from a USA blog. It has a bit about Putin at the top, where he reminds us that Blair got Putin on board the Afghanistan mission. Scroll down to see how he reckons Brown might be discovering that being PM is not as easy as Blair made it look.

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Update to the below: 23:00 I think we might find the blogosphere and the Sundays full of this story tomorrow. It seems the Brownites who used to quite like popping over here have suddenly been put out by the criticism of their boy. So, I thought I might add a link or two to let people like my regular commenter, Tony J, know that I’m not alone in thinking that Brown has blown it, and may even have blown Labour’s long term future.This blog says, somewhat reluctantly, what some of us have known for quite some time. Blair is cleverer than Brown. It also links through to Adam Boulton’s thoughts and how he tried to get Brown to put a lid on it – and Brown refused.6th October, 2007, 4:00pmOK, SOME OF US WERE RIGHT…BUT WHY DID BROWN GET IT SO WRONG TO START WITH?Since I invariably trust the BBC (!) and they have just said that Brown is expected to announce soon that he is about to say the November election’s off – I mean, not on, I’m only gloating a little.

It was always to be expected that GB would want to have his own mandate, and the “events” of the summer meant that he could not call it straight away (well, that’s a reasonable excuse to cover your indecision, Mr GB, so you can use it) . But, unless he was getting 10 – 12% leads in the opinion polls regularly over, say a three month period, it was never a risk worth taking.

It’s been clear for days now, since Cameron pulled it off at his conference, that Labour & Brown were on the back foot over all of this.

And to listen to Labour ministers trying to wriggle out of questions on the media on the whole business – well, Brown must have been getting the TB/GB’s back.

So there we are then.

Now he’ll only have to live with being called cowardly, indecisive, opportunistic, etc. Prime ministers have been called worse. And, Brown could have been the shortest-serving prime minister EVER, apart from the one who died in office.

This was George Canning – remember him?
However Canning’s health by this time was in steep decline. He died on August 8, 1827, in the very same room where Charles James Fox met his own end, 21 years earlier. To this day Canning’s total period in office remains the shortest of any Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, a mere 119 days. He is buried in Westminster Abbey. [1]
[There was also the Marquess of Rockingham, who survived only 14 weeks as PM in 1782. However, this was actually his second stab at the job.] He did something useful in that 14 week period, though: he acknowledged the independence of the USA. Not an insignificant legacy for less than 100 days in office.

But now, after all the shilly-shallying, all the parties’ election machines are well oiled and in gear. Brown might expect an even bigger loss of authority when he does finally throw himself at the mercy of the voters. That’ll be in 2010 then, other factors being equal. Any date predictions from you? Nick Robinson reckons it’s 2009.

 

Here’s mine: May, 2010. With five years possible, since Blair’s 2005 win, that’ll do for GB/PM. And three years as PM is better than 100 odd days, Mr GB/PM, is it not?

And it’ll give the Tories plenty of time to chew over their own policy issues and start to get upset with one another. Why not, indeed?

Meanwhile Tony Blair can relax. His legacy is safe for a bit longer; well, sort of.

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