Tory Entryism
Luke Akehurst, after his withering attack on LabourHome’s poll declaring that most of the party membership want Gordon Brown to leave office, has set up a group called “We don’t want a Labour leadership election“.
Unfortunately for him it has, like the poll, been hijacked by Tories. Within its ranks are such well known-leftwingers as a former researcher to a Conservative MP, two Conservative Future chairmen, and Tory Bear.
Spot the Tories
Beyond the diehards, it seems the only friends Brown has are Tories.
Sphere: Related ContentA Question of Leadership
One more trick up his sleeve?
If the Prime Minister feels that the pressure exerted from the challenge to his authority will push him from office, will he jump by calling a general election?
Given his personality, this is less of a facetious question than it may first appear to be. Gordon Brown is known to be an immensely vicious political fighter, and when the stakes are that high it may be the last option available to him. Facing a general election with an unsettled question of party leadership would spell complete disaster for Labour; its unpopularity would be married to uncertainty and their share of the vote would diminish further. The threat of this nuclear option may be the strategy Brown adopts to save his career: threatening that if he goes, they all will go too.
Brown has for weeks been warning that any leadership challenger would have to face a snap election to establish any kind of popular mandate. It is entirely possible that he may now escalate this into a more direct threat of calling that election himself.
Like any nuclear option the possibility of bluffing and miscalculation remains high. Many Labour MPs may consider it an empty threat: they would look to the Prime Minister’s less than courageous record in other fields, and his failure to put David Miliband in his place. Wiser ones should look to his darker side: his ruthless, calculating and spiteful streaks. These may well lead him to commit one last act to spite those who would wield the dagger, and make sure that they never wear the crown they so desire.
Sphere: Related Content
