Brown becomes Labour leader today, though not Prime Minister until next week. We also find out the result of the Labour Deputy Leadership race, the latest odds have Alan Johnson in pole position, though there have been reports of a late surge of bets on Harriet Harman.
There also appears to have been a 'Brown bounce' in Labour support, which is reflected in the Sunday papers' opinion polls and in the projection if they were translated into a General Election. Depressingly, this gives a Labour majority of 4, though Labour still lose the Basildon South and East Thurrock seat, which is the the target for my particular arm of the Conservative Party. The question is can Brown sustain his new-found lead as John Major did when he took over from Margaret Thatcher, or will the nation fail to warm to our rather dour new Prime Minister.
We shall see.
2 comments:
I would start seriously thinking about turning that Labour majority of 4 into a Tory majority of 50+ without making cheap cracks at our new Prime Minister. Judging by how well Brown has kept the economy going while Blair messes about internationally and the media being more sympathetic to him already even before he takes over No 10, I would suspect that a parliamentary candidate like yourself should be thinking more about policy and less about personality.
There are plenty of people out there who switched to Tory from Labour last time - like myself in fact - who are on the verge of switching back now that the right person for the good of the country is in the hotseat. Don't forget Labour have their hands on the levers of power, and the media want a different style from Blair.
Hint.
A couple of things: Brown has not been absent elsewhere while Blair made his mistakes, though he has tried very hard to give that impression. In fact, a great deal of policy that was utterly unrelated to the economy has stemmed from the Treasury. For example, if you want to know why our army has got smaller in the middle of two wars and our soldiers have to buy their own boots, then look at the Defence budget, which is set by the treasury. Secondly, and more importantly, personalities matter. Decisions are not made by robots objectively analysing the facts, but by real, imperfect people. That Harriet Harman appears to have no grasp of detail is important. That Gordon Brown is a highly intelligent and moral man, but has a dour and controlling worldview is important. Don't misunderstand me, he will be my Prime Minister too and I with him well for the good of our country. I just think that there are quite a few people who could do a considerably better job at it.
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