Is Alistair Darling being replaced at Better Together?

This morning’s Daily Mail claims that Alistair Darling has been quietly dumped as chief of Better Together, the campaign for a “No” vote in the Scottish independence referendum.

Douglas Alexander, Labour Shadow Foreign Secretary and election co-ordinator, made a speech on independence yesterday, and he is tipped in the article to take over. It’s suggested that removing Darling would reinvigorate a campaign that has come into criticism in recent months as some polls show a narrowing of the lead over pro-independence.

It is also suggested that the prominent position of Darling has been a block to further involvement from Gordon Brown. The relationship between the former Chancellor and Prime Minister is rumoured to be tense after Brown was accused of “unleashing the forces of hell” on Darling in the latter’s memoirs.

However, Jim Murphy has taken to Twitter this morning to dismiss the story as “total fiction” – highlighting a recent poll lead:

Replacing the person running the show at this point, with only a few months left until the vote, would look like panic has set in – and surely Douglas Alexander has enough on his plate with Labour’s election campaign? The risks for Better Together look like they’d heavily outweigh the advantages of such a decision. They’ve got some of the best campaigning minds in UK politics working for them and it seems unlikely they’d make such a bizarre mistake when the stakes are so high.