Gordon Clown .Com

After taking a pasting at the polls on Thursday, obtaining a meagre 26% of the popular vote and losing control of the Scottish Parliament, Gordon must be wondering what message the general public are trying to send him. Blair, having promised to serve a full third term, looks set to take the money and run next week, looking forward to having more free time to spend “up George Bush’s arse” in the future, as the BBC suggested on Have I Got News For You. Gordon, meanwhile, is facing virtually no opposition in the leadership contest - most likely because in the next 2 years the job of Prime Minister will undoubtedly become a poison chalice as the chaos caused by his economic mismanagement while in No. 11 begins to unfold.

There can be only one message to take from Thursdays humiliation for Gordon - the public doesn’t want you as Prime Minister, and therefore you must call a general election once you take over as leader of the Labour party. The Tory’s election campaign slogan from 2005 of “vote Blair, get Brown” appears to have come true, and the country at large is lodging its protest vote here and now.

With the polls looking awful, allegations of electoral fraud in Leeds and severe mismanagement of the chaos that has occured concerning the Scottish ballot papers, things aren’t looking too promising for a Brown premiership. The Scotsman highlights Gordon’s difficulties north of the border:

GORDON Brown yesterday suffered a massive personal blow to his status as prime-minister-in-waiting after the party he aspires to lead lost an election in his own backyard.

The Chancellor had played a major role in the Scottish Labour Party campaign, both with repeated public visits, and as a key strategist behind the scenes.

Yesterday’s disastrous result for Labour could set up years of constitutional wrangles for Mr Brown, who is likely to have to fend off attacks from the SNP in Edinburgh.

The message is clear to Gordon - the nation demands an election.

Apparently, Gordon has said that he refuses to work together with the SNP in the Scottish parliament, not withstanding the massive defeat that Labour will almost certainly suffer in the elections on Thursday:

Gordon Brown last night warned Scottish voters that he will find it “impossible” to work as prime minister with a Scottish National party-led government in Edinburgh if its leader, Alex Salmond, refuses to abandon his “dangerous and disastrous” plans for independence.

With Labour facing the prospect of losing an election in Scotland for the first time since 1955 to a hostile coalition in his home base, Mr Brown made an impassioned plea to wavering supporters to “come home to Labour” and head off the separatist threat of a “day one conflict strategy” if the SNP wins on Thursday.

Ladbrokes makes the SNP 1/5 favourites to be the largest party with 46 seats to Labours expected 40, but 65 seats in total are required for a majority, which would leave the SNP free to attempt to construct a deal with either Labour or a collection of other parties including the Lib Dems and Greens.

Mr Brown argued yesterday that a new generation of young Scots voters are much more internationally minded than their elders and not “obsessed with constitutional wrangling”.

A “Labour-led Scottish parliament and a UK Labour government can focus on the No 1 priority, not creating constitutional chaos but building a world-class education system,” he said, refusing to concede the possibility of having to work with Mr Salmond.

Now, what is the likelihood of Gordon having a change of heart after the full reality of Labour’s crushing Scottish defeat becomes clear on Friday morning?

The Times has revealed today that Labour party workers in Leeds are deliberately attempting to rig postal votes by collecting them from voters and selectively posting only the Labour votes.  A Times undercover reporter posing as a Labour volunteer recorded this conversation:

Keith Wakefield, the leader of the Labour group on Leeds city council, drives two students and an undercover reporter to Gipton and Harehills.

Wakefield: So our job, I believe, will be to make sure they have either done it [their postal vote] or we help them…Now the reason why it’s really, really important on this one: the average postal votes for a ward in [the] city is 800 to 1,000, there’s 4,000 postal votes [in Gipton and Harehills]… So it’s make or break…as you know, more people vote through postal than not. If we can get back those votes for Labour we can win this. So it’s really, really important that we chase the votes. I have never known as many postal votes in any election in 20 years.

Student 2: Do you know why it’s so many?

Wakefield: Yes. We can speak amongst friends. It’s very much an Asian, half Asian, half white working-class ward. And er, both, all the parties use the Muslim connections, which probably some people would frown at, and families to get everyone on postal.

Student 1: That’s exactly what we’ve done in our ward.

Wakefield: Oh right yes. So while there is paranoia in the country about the use of Asian voting systems…as we all know, they have a brilliant network; they pass it on; they all want to use the postal.

Wakefield, students and undercover reporter arrive in the car park at the Fairway pub in Gipton and meet Graham Hyde, a Labour councillor. Hyde briefs the group on what to do.

Hyde: Simply, what I want you to do is you knock on the door, say you are from the Labour party…‘Have you received your postal votes?… These are all Labour people. ‘Have you returned it?’ If they give it to you in your hand, you collect it and put it in the postbox…If they haven’t, you say: ‘Have you got your postal vote?’

Wakefield: You’ve got to do it for them.

Hyde: The thing is we want to know who has returned them. And if you are knocking on the door and they have a postal vote and they haven’t done it, ‘Would you like to do it? We’ll put it in the post?’ You have to do it very careful…because they [the opposition or the authorities] are watching everyone.

Wakefield: I know, I know.

Hyde: All these here are postal votes.

Wakefield: All we are doing is chasing the postal… Do you have to seal it [the postal ballot] before posting?

Hyde: Yeah, seal it all up… We also want to check they are voting Labour as well. Yeah? If they are voting Liberal Dem, then don’t offer to put the postal vote in. We’ve found 10 so far out of all those we’ve done in Gipton.

Student 3: ‘Yes, I’ll post that for you!’ [laughs]

Hyde: Yes that’s it, and then it ends up in the toilet [laughs]. I know…Put the postal vote form out of sight, or if you are passing a postbox throw it in it. Don’t get caught with any on you. We are not supposed to collect them.

Student 4: Yes, it’s illegal to collect.

Hyde: Yeah.

Reporter: Is it? Why?

Student 4: It’s illegal to collect, isn’t it?

Hyde: Yes it is, but we’ve done 25% already, so…

It’s reported in the newspapers today that Gordon has said he intends to serve seven years as PM, three in this term before a general election in 2010, followed by another four years assuming he wins.  However, with public opinion firmly against him and an unfolding economic disaster waiting to happen, it’s far more likely that Gordon will struggle to survive his first 3 years, let alone achieve any more.  Gordon was effectively given a get-out-of-jail-free card today by David Miliband, who has announced he does not intend to stand against Brown in the competition for the Labour leadership likely to take place in a few months time.  Of course it matters little what happens to Gordon now, the damage has already been done.

Mr Miliband said that he was “not a candidate” in the race for Labour leader. He would still be under 50 in seven years’ time.

Under the plan being discussed, Mr Brown would serve for one full Parliament if he wins the next election.

“Gordon is planning to do three years (to the next election) and four years and then step down,” an ally said.

“That is seven years. You only have to look at Thatcher and Blair, who did 10 years.”

Gordon was dealt the final insult by Tony Blair today, who failed to show up to the Commons to vote for Gordon in the no-confidence motion.  One has to wonder that if Blair had been compelled to vote, which way he might actually have voted.

Mervyn King was forced to write a letter to Gordon today after the Chav Price Index hit 3.1%, the highest level since the measure began in 97.  The RPI, a more true measure of inflation, rose to 4.8%.  Last time RPI was at these levels, interest rates were 7-8%, yet the Bank of England seems content that rates around 5% are enough to control inflation.  Evan Davis hit the nail on the head today when he asserted that the China deflator may not be having such an influence as before.  The Bank predicts CPI will fall back to target by the end of the year, but they have been incorrect with predictions in the past.  If this prediction were to prove incorrect, the timing could not be worse.  The letter, incidentally, was barely worth the 10-year wait, and was largely along the lines of “please don’t sack me”.
Meanwhile Gordon will soon face a vote of no confidence in parliament over the pensions fiasco, the Tories using an opposition day to table the necessary motion.  This being parliament, Gordon is unlikely to lose the vote, but another vote - the local elections taking place in the first week of May - could prove far more damaging for Gordon.

With the local election campaign kicking off, Guido Fawkes has been doing a daily update showing whereabouts Gordon has been off campaigning, and what he’s been up to. At least it keeps him out of Westminster dreaming up new ways to rob us of our hard earned. Here’s the round-up so far:

Day 1, April 3: Gordon was mumbling at a press conference about having only “30 days to save devolution”. He left behind a typed crib sheet with phrases such as “Tony Blair has always agreed with me in the difficult decisions I have had to take and I have always agreed with him.” He also left his handwritten notes behind which amused all graphologists.

Day 2, April 4: Gordon was in Edinburgh launching a Fabian pamphlet with Douglas Alexander making the case against freedom for Scotland.

Day 3, April 5: Today Gordon was off to Gleneagles, promising to “give every child in the world a better chance - freed from poverty and liberated by education.”

A few months ago UNICEF reported that British children were the unhappiest in the Western world. Youth unemployment is higher now than it was in 1997. 15% of British school-leavers are functionally illiterate. Bit early to be claiming “mission accomplished” at home?

Day 4, April 6: Speaking at a joint press conference with Jack McConnell, the Scottish First Minister, Mr Brown accused the SNP of ducking questions.

Speaks from back of a bus to (ironically) anti-democratic communists condemning anti-democratic racists about “Hope not Hate”. Video here.

According to the Guardian “Our cheery chancellor of the exchequer’s bold makeover as a hip, contempo dude has, it seems, a wee way to go yet. Appearing with Celebrity Big Brother runner-up Jermaine Jackson on the Mirror’s anti-racism bus in Glasgow, the Broon, who foolishly spent the early 1970s battling with a doctoral thesis on the Scottish Labour party (1918 to 1929) rather than jiving on down with the Jackson 5, first needed an advance Treasury briefing on who exactly Jermaine was. He then, since no one had thought it necessary to tell him that Jermaine was a man not a woman, boarded the bus, strode up to JJ’s wife, shook her hand, and told her how very much he enjoyed her work. And to think he’s our next PM.”

He was also a speaker at the annual lunch of the Newspaper Press Fund in Glasgow.

Day 8, April 10: Gordon Brown was at Mossmorran in Fife praising ExxonMobil and Shell’s contribution to the economy.

Happy Easter, Gordon!  As people all over Britain unwrap their chocolate eggs this morning, Gordon is discovering his very own sickly surprise as a Times/YouGov poll reveals that 57% of people think he is unfit to lead the country, after the damaging pensions trickery was revealed last week.  Only 41% thought he was doing a good job as Chancellor, down from 51% in March.  Meanwhile, over half of those polled characterised Tony Blair as “out of touch, untrustworthy and overly concerned with spin”.

Finance minister Gordon Brown, overwhelming favorite to succeed Tony Blair as prime minister, suffered a blow on Sunday when an opinion poll showed more than half of Britons thought he was unfit to lead the country.

In another setback for Brown, a newspaper said there was growing pressure for another member of the cabinet to challenge the Chancellor of the Exchequer for the leadership of the Labour Party when Blair steps down.

Blair is widely expected to quit in June or July after a decade in office. With no serious challenger yet emerging, Brown has been seen as a virtually automatic choice to succeed Blair as party leader and prime minister.

But some Labour politicians doubt Brown’s leadership credentials and opinion polls show he would fare badly against David Cameron leader of the main opposition Conservatives.

The Sunday Times said only 27 percent of 2,218 people questioned in a YouGov poll thought Brown was fit to be prime minister after a row last week over his handling of pensions. Fifty-seven percent thought him unfit.

The poll showed Britons were losing faith in Brown’s stewardship of the economy — his strong point until now.

Forty-one percent thought Brown was doing a good job as finance minister, down from 51 percent in March.

Not great for Gordon.  Meanwhile, it seems a serious challenger in the upcoming leadership contest could be emerging as John Reid has revealed that he will back a David Miliband led challenge to Brown’s bid for Number 10.  Gordon was hoping for a clear run to nextdoor, but now it is becoming increasingly clear that he may face a full leadership campaign, with all the dirty dealing revelations that is likely to bring out into the open.

John Reid, the Home Secretary, will back a Labour leadership challenge by David Miliband in order to stop Gordon Brown taking over, The Sunday Telegraph has learnt.

If Mr Miliband does not stand, Mr Reid is even prepared to fight the Chancellor himself as a “last resort”, friends have disclosed.

The revelations are a huge setback for Mr Brown’s hopes of taking over from Tony Blair, almost certainly at the end of June, as smoothly as possible.

They also offer the starkest evidence of the seriousness of the split between the Chancellor and Cabinet ministers who want to preserve the Prime Minister’s political legacy.

Mr Reid’s intervention means that Mr Miliband, the Environment Secretary, who was on a family holiday in France last week, is under the most concentrated pressure he has yet faced to run against Mr Brown, the overwhelming bookmakers’ favourite to be the next prime minister.

Mr Reid, seen as a potential candidate until a series of -crises at the Home Office, has been tipped as likely to remain in his job under Mr Brown. But that now appears impossible with Mr Reid ready, according to his friends, to act as Mr Miliband’s “standard bearer” inside the Cabinet and even to stand himself if no other credible challenger enters the fray. The decision raises the prospect of a Miliband-Reid “dream ticket” trading on the Environment Secretary’s youth and the Home Secretary’s experience.

“John wants David to stand against Gordon,” said a close friend of Mr Reid. “He believes he will do so - and that if he does, he can win. It will take balls to stand. But there is no use saying ‘wait till next time’, because there may not be a next time. John is making it clear he does not want to stand himself. He will be 60 next month. But if nobody else does, he will, as a last resort.”

The developments make it certain, for the first time, that a Cabinet-level challenger will declare he or she will fight Mr Brown. Any candidate must first obtain the signatures of 44 MPs, but friends of the Home Secretary say that would be no problem for either Mr Miliband or Mr Reid, such is the growing disillusionment about the Chancellor among backbenchers.

In recent weeks, according to senior Blairites, the party’s private polling has shown the Chancellor’s popularity falling badly among voters - particularly after his 2p cut in income tax was denounced as a Budget “con trick” by the Tories and he was found to have acted against warnings from his civil servants in his decision to launch a “raid” on pension funds in 1997 which has cost them £100 million.

Ministers close to Mr Blair also believe the next Labour leader should be English. They suggested that Mr Blair feared that Mr Brown would “wreck” New Labour’s achievements.

The pain continues for Gordon today as readers of the Telegraph are asked to comment on how the Great Pension Robbery Of 1997 will affect them.  The sentiment is clear for all to see, and it’s not pretty.  It must be plain to all but the most backward members of the general public now that Brown has created a crisis waiting to happen by raiding our future to pay for his.  The Labour Party will surely soon realise Gordon is a lame duck candidate and a non-starter as Labour leader and Prime Minister.  Who knows what damage he could do if he ever makes it as far as nextdoor?

Some of the comments by Telegraph readers are shown below to give an impression of just how anti-Gordon the public is becoming:

Mr Brown should face criminal charges for stealing £100bn of pension funds from us over the last 10 years.
He is a duplicitous serial offender from whom we have no protection.

…

I am age 68 and it looks as if I will need to work to age 75 in order to erase the damage made to my pension by Mr Brown, I ask the people of England, do we want this man in charge of us ?. I think not.

…

The RECENT REVELATIONS with the release of the ’suppressed’ treasury documents show just how completely Gordon Brown is unfit for high office. I had always assumed that his disasterous decision to abolish the tax relief on pension fund investments was due to incompetence. Now I realise just how callous the man is. Along with millions of others my pension fund will be worth at best half of what I had expected when originally planning my retirement. The number of families destined to have a much poorer quality of life in retirement can directly lay the blame on one person. Adding ’salt’ to the wound is the realisation that his generous pension postion is not only ‘ringfenced’ but will be paid for by his many victims.

…

This is a disgrace. He ignored advice and has ruined, or will be responsible for the ruin, of the lives of nearly everyone in the country except for foreign immigrants. In better times this would have been a resignation issue. I expect we wont even get an apology. Blame the CBI? Like all New Labour they blame everyone but themselves and take responsibility for nothing.

The above are just a handful of the 250 comments that the Telegraph website has received on this issue at the time of writing, universally condeming Gordon Brown for his out-and-out theivery.

A couple of nasties for Gordon have hit the front pages this week. The Times and the Telegraph brought us these headlines:

First of all, the Daily Telegraph gave us the frontpage seen on the right here, with the headline Brown losing his touch on the economy, say voters. The Telegraph/YouGov poll is the second bad result in two days for Gordon, following on from the Guardian/ICM poll the day before that said he is currently completely failing to convince the country that he would make a better prime minister than David Cameron. The Telegraph gave these results in their article, also highlighting some of the problems that Gordon has run into lately:

Gordon Brown is losing his reputation for economic competence and failing to convince voters he would make a better prime minister than David Cameron, a Daily Telegraph-YouGov poll shows today.

The Conservatives are now seen as more likely than Labour to run the economy well — the most significant turnaround in the public’s view of the Tories since they were swept from power by New Labour a decade ago.

The poll is a big blow for Mr Brown on the day that:

• Michael Meacher, the veteran Left-winger, threw his hat into the ring for the leadership race;

• one of Britain’s leading businessmen said the delayed handover of power at the head of Labour was slowing efforts to cut costs and improve efficiency in the public sector;

• he announced his 11th, and almost certainly final, Budget will be delivered on Wednesday March 21.

When voters were asked which party was likely to run the economy well, 30 per cent said the Conservatives and 27 per cent Labour.

At the 2005 election, Labour had a commanding 22-point lead, with 49 per cent regarding them as economically competent compared to 27 per cent for the Tories.

While the regular survey of voting intentions gives the Conservatives a five-point lead over Labour, this jumps to nine points when voters are asked whether they would prefer a Cameron or a Brown-led government.

This last result is particularly damaging for Gordon, showing that he is even less popular than Blair even now, while Blair is being accused of dodgy dealings in the cash for honours scandal, plus all the sour tastes associated with Iraq and Afghanistan.

The Times also had this to offer on its Saturday front page: Consumers hit by credit squeeze as debt spirals. While not directly mentioning Brown, the Times article shows the ridiculousness of the situation that Gordon and his Miracle Economy have left the country in, with debt soaring and consequently bad debt costs for banks hitting unprecedented levels. Of course the next phase of the debt bubble is likely to be somewhat more painful than previous phases, as the inevitable credit crunch threatens to bring Gordon’s house of cards collapsing around his ears sooner rather than later.

Personal insolvency levels rocketed to a record 107,000 cases last year. The Financial Services Authority said last month that Britain’s huge personal debt levels — now more than £1.3 trillion including mortgages — were one of the biggest risks to financial stability.

It added that, although most people were managing, a rise in unemployment or interest rates could tip many households into real difficulty.

Up to 2 million households are estimated to be “permanently indebted” — able to meet minimum interest payments but with no real prospect of ever paying off their debts. Total unsecured borrowing by households in Britain has doubled to £212 billion in the past nine years.

It won’t be much fun when the music stops.

Not much of a happy 56th Birthday for Gordon on Tuesday, as The Guardian reported that he is now trailing Cameron by 13 points in the latest opinion poll:

Gordon Brown is failing to persuade the public that he would make a better prime minister than David Cameron, according to a Guardian/ICM poll published today which suggests the Conservatives could win a working majority at the next general election.

Voters give the Tories a clear 13-point lead when asked which party they would back in a likely contest between Mr Brown, Mr Cameron and Sir Menzies Campbell.

The result would give the party 42% of the vote against Labour on 29%, similar to its performance under Michael Foot in 1983. The Liberal Democrats would drop to 17%. The result is the highest that the Conservatives have scored in any ICM poll since July 1992, just after their last general election victory.

Pretty unhappy birthday all around for Gordon then. It is now just under a month to go until Gordon makes what will probably (one way or another) be his final budget speech, and with such a dramatic deficit to claw back in the public opinion, who knows what crazy hair-brained schemes he may introduce in attempts to boost his popularity before it’s too late?