The day that hate won – at the expense of Gordon Brown
BY THE time you read this, Gordon Brown may no longer be Prime Minister. The election results from Sunday night were not only damning for the Labour Party, they were yet another nail in the coffin of Brown’s leadership, one that has been fraught with slumping opinion polls and botched opportunities. Consider the numbers: The only two parties to lose a percentage of the vote from 2004 were Labour, who lost 7%, and the Lib Dems, who lost 1.1%. Of the 8.1% of the vote that was available, it is surprising that the three parties to make the largest gains were not the Conservatives or UKIP. The Greens increased by 2.5% of the vote, The Christian Party “Proclaiming Christ’s Lordship” gained 1.7%, and, worryingly, the BNP picked up 1.4%. The Conservatives only gained 1.2%, and UKIP picked up a relatively miserly 0.5%. Translating into seats, however, the results are slightly different. The Greens remain on exactly the same number of seats as in 2004, and the Christian Party are yet to gain a seat. In the two regions in which the BNP gained MEPs (the North West and Yorkshire and the Humber), the seats were taken at the expense of Labour, with all other seats remaining the same.
Whatever the reasons are for the advancement of this less-than-savoury party, one thing is clear; the seats they gained were as a direct result of the disenchantment of Labour voters. These voters would never consider voting for the Conservatives or UKIP, and abandonment by the Labour party, combined with the convincing and misleading campaign run by the BNP, led to them appearing a very attractive alternative.
Fingers will be pointed by many in an attempt to find someone on whom they can pin the blame. The truth is that there is only one direction in which they can be pointed. By persisting doggedly with his electorally untested leadership, by presiding over an erosion in the trust of Parliamentary honesty, and attempting to survive a week of high-profile resignations, Brown has succeeded in alienating those voters whom he most needed to attract in order to keep out the BNP.Much anger has already been expressed in the short time following the elections, and rightly so. It is now time that this anger was directed at the right person, and the demands for departure will now be backed up by the stark evidence before the eyes of the Labour Party – that their weakness as a party played a crucial role in bringing about the election of the first fascists from Britain to walk into the European Union Parliament with a mandate and a platform.
This leads directly to the question of what is wrong with the Labour party. Essentially nothing, except its leadership. With Johnson, or Miliband, or Purnell, or even (dare I say it) Balls in leadership, this would not have happened. Had a general election been held and the current government had a mandate, then the public opinion polls might tell quite a different story. The very fact that Labour ’succeeded’ in coming third rather than fourth nationally in this election, when they still retain a large majority as the governing party, speaks volumes about the vast gap between the public opinion and the current constitution of the House of Commons. The sooner that Brutus Miliband or Johnson plucks up their courage, the better the chances will be of a Labour recovery before next May.
If Brown is gone by the time that you read this, then all that has been said has come true and this article has proved prophetic. If he remains, having already played the cabinet reshuffle card, his only remaining ploy, then it is only a matter of time until the inevitable.
4 responses below. Comments are open.
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Obviously, given the time of writing this reply, hindsight is useful for giving my thoughts some credence, but ultimately last night’s meeting or any other event since Sunday night was never going to prove fatal for Brown, he’d already set himself on carrying on, come what may, and it was clear that Labour MPs could either not bring themselves to collude against him or, frankly, find any suitable alternative leader. The choice for Labour is depressingly clear – split now, get a new leader, be forced to seek an electoral mandate and be thrashed and humiliated at the ballot box now, or wait a year, delay the inevitable but at least give the economy a chance to begin recovery, hope for some strife in the Tory ranks and crumble (probably to a lesser extent) next Spring. A new start with a new government now is clearly in the country’s interests, but since when did they matter in politics?!
Surely the issue is not Labour supporters turning to the BNP but instead not voting at all. Total BNP votes in Yorkshire fell by over 6,000 while turnout fell by 10%.
Gordon Brown has his responsibility in this but as Labour’s vote here fell by 7.5% there must have been others who were disenfranchised.
I do think Brown should go but even I wouldn’t lay all the blame at his feet.
JC: When Ed Balls can be suggested as PM it is clear you are right that the country’s interests do not matter in politics
AS LABOUR START TO DISAPPEAR INTO THE POLITICAL WILDERNESS NEVER TO BE SEEN AGAIN , I LOOK INTO MY GIFT OF PROPHECY AND SEE UKIP VICTORY AHEAD IN NEXT YEARS GENERAL ELECTIONS , IF MY CAMPAIGN TO LEGALISE DRUGS IS A SUCCESS WE COULD EXCEED THE TORYS ? AS THEY ARE SITTING ALONE IN BRUSSELS NOW ANYTHING COULD HAPPEN , AS THE UK COLUMN KEEPS SPREADING THE TRUTH OF TREASON BY TED HEATH BACK IN 1974 THE BRITISH PUBLIC WILL BRING BACK THAT DUNKIRK SPIRIT AND VOTE ,VOTE, VOTE, TO GET OUT OF THE EU ? BRIAN GIRISH AND EX-LONDON POLICEMAN ARE NOW TOURING THE UK AWAKENING EVERYONE? ALBERT BURGESS IS A MAN OF WISDOM REGARDING THE LAWS THAT BIND OUR GREAT UK , HIS TIME IN THE FORCE HAS GIVEN HIM THIS ABUNDANCE OF TRUTH ? AND KNOW-HOW TO SPEAK ? THERE RECENT MEETING AT PENRITH RUGBY CLUB , WAS A GREAT SUCCESS, …WATCH UKIP HIT THAT POLITICAL WINNING POST NEXT YEAR ?
Peter, have you been drinking again?