New Labourites want one of their own as leader – but attempted coups will fail

By Joy Johnson

When Margaret Thatcher was ousted from No 10 Downing Street the cause was obvious. Trafalgar Square was the scene of a riot over the poll tax but it was the fury of constituents that filled the surgeries of Tory MPs and the post bags (no emails then) that were overflowing that led to her being chucked out. Among the political elite it was Europe, but the popular cause was the poll tax. The fact was that these were big and substantial issues.

Yet here we are again – a Labour conference is only days away so it must be time for another attempted coup. But ask those that want to see a change in leadership now and the response is centred on presentation, not substance.

Political journalists are being intravenously fed on gossip and drama by Labour MPs thrashing around looking for someone to blame for their expected trouncing at the polls. Instead of looking to themselves and their past actions – not least the Iraq war where the rot really set in – the answer to all their woes is to change the leader.

Roy Hattersely in today’s Times, writing with his usual eloquence, said that Labour’s problem does not lie with Gordon Brown alone. Hattersley praised Alistair Darling for keeping his head when all around him were losing theirs and pointed out that Alan Johnson’s arguing for holding a polling day ballot on the desirability of ‘electoral reform’ was being opposed by colleagues despite possessing the advantage of being both popular and right. But, and this is the essential point Hattersley asked: …when did either of them – or for that matter, Jack Straw, David Milliband, Ed Balls and Shaun Woodward – make a swingeing attack on the Tories and all they stand for?” (To be fair to Ed Balls he does attack the Tories). The fatalism that many Labour MPs are wallowing in is debilitating.

Past coup attempts have so far failed. The hope that the Prime Minister will manage his own exit and stand down on health grounds (failing eye sight) not having worked means that what was once merely gossip has become part of the Gordon Brown ‘must go’ narrative.

While the talk in the United Nations is on nuclear disarmament, the British media lost its critical facilties and splashed instead on a supposed snub from President Obama to the Prime Minister. To use a well worn cliché – wake up and smell the coffee. We are in a multi-polar world and China and Russia have primacy over the UK. But it is part and parcel of the same media narrative that whatever happens here and on the world stage Gordon Brown has to go.

Last year while the world was looking into the economic abyss inside the political bubble, re-located from Westminster to Manchester, the obsession then was with Gordon Brown’s ‘scary’ smile. If a question mark hung over Brown’s leadership it should have centred on New Labour’s fawning at the feet of the city. And despite all that has happened with greed and recklessness creating an economic mess not seen for generations, and misery for millions, there are still some who kow-tow to ‘failed Gods’.

New Labourites want to get one of their own as leader, and they know the succession has to take place before the election, as it will not be guaranteed afterwards. But even with dire opinion poll ratings, blaming Gordon Brown is far too easy – not least because the Prime Minister made the right moves to recapitalise the banks and stabilise the financial situation, although the public sector should not have to pay the price.

As Roy Hattersley argued:

“The party is facing a crisis of personal courage, confidence and conviction – not of social democratic policy.”

It is about time the fight was taken to the enemy – and that should be the Tories, not Gordon Brown.