‘Governing party does badly in midterm election’ is hardly a shocking story. We are familiar with the arguments about local & Euro polls being second-order elections. We know that the Guardian advocated a vote for the Lib Dems or Greens1. We know that Labour’s fratricidal tendency has come to the fore.
And yet, the share of the vote won by the Conservatives was 38%. That translates into a Commons majority of perhaps 45 seats that could be easily turned into a hung parliament if Labour voters who stayed at home on Thursday can be coaxed into voting. It could even be, with a following wind, a historic fourth term.
How?
The first part of winning a fourth term must be a simple message to all the plotters: put up or shut up. There is a debate to be had about whether we’d fare better under Gordon Brown or another, as yet unnamed, leader. There is no debate that another year of rumour and intrigue under gothic arches will be worse than either. If Brown is still in place on Tuesday – after the PLP meeting – he must stay in place, unopposed, until the election. The discontent about Gordon has been rumbling on for some time. This is the most recent, and most self-destructive, manifestation of that discontent. If senior members of the party continue to undermine our leader, calls for an election will grow louder and louder and our ability to articulate an effective policy platform will grow weaker and weaker.
The reason the Tories want an election now is that they know a year of Labour policies that appeal to people in these nervous economic times could deprive them of government. A good year of governance and progress, with the economy improving – it would appear that the green shoots of economic recovery are poking through – might bring us our fourth term.
Secondly, we must recognise who deeply unattractive this looks to people outside politics. I ask: what are the policy differences between Brown & Purnell? Between Brown & Blears? Between Brown & Flint? It does seem as if these are indeed the first ministers to resign solely on issues of style.
Thirdly, the party as a whole must use the summer recess to regroup and to articulate a set of coherent policies to take us forward into the next election. They must focus on the economy and constitutional reform, but we must keep talking about our successes in the NHS, education and building a fairer society.
xD.
1 – in fairness, they also said vote Labour if your local councillor is a good one. I wonder how many Guardianistas can name their local councillors.
Cross-posted at Common Endeavour
I totally agree Dave. The media want Gordon’s scalp and we should not give it to them.
The Tories and their media allies fear the economy getting back on track more than anything which is why they tried to implode the system by leaking the expenses info. They are desperate for an early election.
I’m backing Gordon Brown for sure.
1. Furthermore to Dave’s point, there’s such an obvious pattern to the attempted stabs at Gordon. Blears, Purnell, Falconer, Hutton, Flint. The Blairites’ attempt to destroy Gordon & the party is abhorrent. There is no reason why Gordon can’t win a general election. There’s no where near the vibe for Cameron as there was for Blair in 1996, and his empty policy cupboard is such an open goal.
Gordon does need a sustained attack on the Conservatives and need to stop Cameron from creating the media agenda. If he’s not good at this side of PR, surely he can find advisers who are.
Gordon needs to hammer home a few messages. Firstly the Tories would take Britain down the same road in this recession as they did with the last one – i.e. let half the country go to the wall. Secondly that only Labour truly cares about the poorest in society – while the Tory frontbench only represents the fruits of privilege.
Deal with the Blairites, hammer hope Cameron’s vacuous policies and shameful opportunism, support education, health & society (and while you’re at it, scrap ID cards,) and your got your fourth time Gordon!
You are of course taking the piss, brown is dead in the water, he is praying for the unemployment to drop the banks to lend, while allowing the bank of England to print money like water. This government has without doubt lived off a lie and the lie had died and Brown has no answer.
I think you’ll find it’s a bit more complicated than that.
There’s no doubt that we’re in a poor economic situation and that we were relatively exposed to the credit crunch because of the City’s importance to UK plc. However, things aren’t as bad as they could be and are, perhaps, showing signs of improvement. Inaction would have led us to worse consequences.
xD.