Will Mandelson last until the General Election?
Dear Peter Mandelson,
As we approach Christmas, there is plenty to be happy about – not least having a few days off work and reading about more Labour infighting in the press. Rumours are flying around yet again, not only about whether Brown will survive until the election but whether you will survive as well.
First we had signs of a rift between yourself and Gordon Brown over recent weeks. Your unhappiness at the attack on bankers’ bonuses and national insurance hike plus your absence from any significant media outlets since the PBR suggests that you simply cannot stomach trotting out the utter nonsense produced by Brown and Darling. Today, I read that a disagreement over a Government shake-up of lucrative address databases has intensified tensions between you and Gordo, who wants to make postcode information freely available as part of a Whitehall efficiency drive when it currently makes more than £20 million a year for Royal Mail. Apparently, you are feeling increasingly sidelined and you’re angry that this was announced without you even being consulted.
Now the rumours that Brown might not last until the election are back again accompanied by the suggestion that he could be asked to stand down as leader in the New Year but allowed to stay as Prime Minister until the general election, which Labour would fight under a new leader. Allies of the PM last night dismissed the idea as “mad” but there is a certain twisted logic to what is being referred to as the “Aznar option”. In August 2003, Jose Maria Aznar, the Spanish Prime Minister, announced that he would retire at the next election, proposed Mariano Rajoy as his successor and remained as Prime Minister until the March 2004 poll. Although his Popular Party lost, this was blamed on his response to the Madrid train bombings. Supporters of the plan want Brown to announce it in January, with a new party leader chosen in February. The most likely candidates would be David Miliband and Alan Johnson, although a left-of-centre figure such as the backbencher Jon Cruddas might run. A leadership contest before the general election would probably enable Labour to avoid the bloody fight expected after an election defeat. The new Labour leader would also take part in the three TV election debates with Cameron and Clegg.
If I were a betting man, I wouldn’t expect this to come to pass, but I wonder how long someone with your political savvy and understanding of the political landscape would want to hang around if Brown doesn’t jump ship early next year. Do you really want to put up with this incessant left-of-centre onslaught that Brown had gleefully reverted to? Will you be able to put up with a Labour election manifesto that is full of yet more spurious accusations, false claims and irrelevant policies? Could you honestly sit back and watch Ed Balls take charge of the Labour Party election campaign? It all sounds too much for someone like you. You have worked so hard to turn the tide against the Conservatives with your deception, soundbites and general nastiness, yet this could all count for nothing if the Brown/Balls ‘axis of evil’ takes over. Can you survive until the next election? Maybe, but as with everything else in politics, nothing is guaranteed.
Yours sincerely,
A.Tory
Witanagemot Blogs
Dear LFAT. Some points for consideration.
1. If there was sufficient momentum for change in the Labour party, Gordon would have been defenestrated last Summer. Labour MP’s are not chosen for their independence of thought and personal courage, but their ability to toe the Party Line, fill out an expense sheet and trip bleating into the correct lobby. It is now far too late for a change in, I almost wrote “leadership” but let’s amend that to figurehead, as there is no time for the new person to distance himself from the last disasterous 4 years. No sane socialist MP would replace Brown at this time, and anyone who did would be pilloried as only doing the job for the pension.
2. Mandy knows that as soon as he makes himself available, there will be a senior position for him in the EU oligarchy. A supreme politician such as he is has probably already arranged his departure from the sinking ship, and the timing will be a matter of personal preference. Noting his vindictive nature, I reckon 4-6 weeks before Election Day would cause maximum adverse impact. Back in the EU Kremlin, he will be able to do the Conservatives far more damage than as a plotter and cogger in a seriously divided Labour Party.
The Labour party is so splintered that I do not see how the likes of Frank Field and Kate Hoey can continue to live with such as Ed Balls and John Cruddas. Deepseated idealogical divides ensure that Labour is due to implode and redefine itself, a process that is to be hoped to take at least a decade before they can threaten our Nation once more.
BTW. May I wish all the usual suspects a joyous Christmas and as prosperous a New Year as circumstances will allow.
Spot on LFAT.
Just before I clicked on your house over at my house the same thoughts were rumbling through my head. I predict a shambolic result for Labour, but that was with Gordo remaining in place as leader. I don’t see Alan Johnson as leader, but I can see how Millibland may look attractive to them. Labour have made so many mistakes that if there is any justice in the world, they simply have to have a long cold taste of the opposition benches. They need to reflect for a term or two. Or four. Or ten.
Not that I think the Tories will be any different. And the LibDems haven’t tasted power for 90 years or so.
I’d like to see some fresh blood, with fresh ideas to reinvigorate politics and I’d like to see some much needed, and sustained interaction with the voters.
Mind you, if I have read the Treaty on European Union correctly, parliament is now null and void.
CR.
The Aznar option is interesting as it’s the only chance the non-loony left ‘Blairite’ rump have to not see Labour in opposition lurch to the left under a Harman or Cruddas. Which is what will happen if Labour lose the election since its all Blairites and ‘moderates’ in the vulnerable seats, right up to Cabinet level.
And, I suspect, that’s precisely why Labour won’t do it. It would mean acknowledging inevitable defeat and getting an early start on the factional in-fighting for the soul of the Labour party, a fight that is inevitable but one that, after the 80s, holds no particular attraction for anyone. Nobody who lived through that period, even Mandy, is keen to get back to that kind of work.
On the other hand, it is panto season and whenever I see Gordon, I get the urge to shout ‘look behind you’ to where I expect to see Mandy lurking with sharpened steel…
I have a feeling that Mandelson will come out of this smelling of roses as per usual. No matter what he does, he always ends up with a plum job and a huge salary plus perks.
Labour was always the party of isolationism, trade barriers and against the EU because they thought it was a charter for big business, though at times with close links to the comintern because they were in favour of planning. How does someone like Mandelson resolve himself with such a reversal of ideology?
That’s the key to his survival, he will work for whoever looks like they can provide the money and the power. He will lie to the voters, to his own party, to himself if necessary, and he is very good at what he does.
He is not fit to polish his grandfather’s boots.
I have a view that probably the only people who hate Mandelson more than the rest of us are those of the PLP.
Think about it. For years they’ve watched his mendacious comings and goings (more mendacious even than their own), at the same time always seeming to prosper and enrich himself. They’ve noted his fancy, mega-rich and influential ‘friends’. They’ve seen his succession of ‘elevations’. And, most recently, they’ve seen him return to dominate all, while they – even at the highest levels – have become little more than ciphers. They must be saying (although not to us!), “Thanks, Gordon. Thanks a bunch”. Oh, and they know he’s much too clever for his own good, or certainly much cleverer than they are.
In the near future, there’s no chance even for Mandelson to turn thing rounds or to rebuild the Party in the short term. And my guess is Mandelson don’t do opposition.
No. When Brown goes, either as leader or prime minster, Mandelson goes too: no doubt smelling of roses.
I’m not sure Mandelson will leave when Brown does. If a leadership contender can offer Mandelson a good deal and a plush job, he simply cannot say no.
Imagine if Miliband’s leadership campaign team offered Mandelson the post of Shadow Foreign Secretary…..
“Back in the EU Kremlin, he will be able to do the Conservatives far more damage than as a plotter and cogger in a seriously divided Labour Party.”
That would merely bring forward the clash between the UK and the EU that Brown’s ratification of Lisbon made inevitable.
There seems to be a sort of general concensus that Labour will loose the coming General Election. Whether Mandleson is around or not. Really? – How many disenchanted Conservative voters will vote BNP or UKIP? Think about those millions of public sector workers. Turkeys don’t vote for Christmas. The result is by no means a done deal. Next May or whenever could well see Brown returned as Prime Minister. Granted that the incoming Labour Government would then have to deal with years of its own profligacy and financial mis-management. The resulting chaos would be truly appalling. Could it happen? Damn right it could.
“Will you be able to put up with a Labour election manifesto that is full of yet more spurious accusations, false claims and irrelevant policies?”
Never bothered him in the past.
Let me boldly predict that Peter Mandelson will survive….. until Christmas and maybe a bit beyond.
‘a process that is to be hoped to take at least a decade before they can threaten our Nation once more.’
Good post GoM, but I hope it’s nowhere near as soon as 10 years. It’ll take a generation or more to undo the rank destruction they have inflicted on every part of this society.
If we ever can.