What Gordon Brown should have said

Gordon Brown made the same mistake this morning that he made last year when he pushed out Tony Blair. Then he tried saying that Mr Blair had not been pressured and was going at a time of his own choosing. This was obviously untrue and that damaged Mr Brown. But he hasn't, it seems, learned from the error.

Was admitting the truth, that opinion polls put him off, impossible? I don't think so.

Here's what I would have advised him to say if I was one of his team:

Yes, I considered calling an election. And here's why. There are two options for a new Prime Minister. Asking voters for their trust in advance, or waiting until new policies have had a chance to work. I have been thinking about both these possibilities.

The polls were a large part of this. They have shown that people are enthusiastic, keen to back my vision for change. And that made me think hard about the idea of winning a fresh mandate which might make it easier to get Parliamentary backing for some of our most controversial ideas, ideas like reform of the Lords.

But the polls have also been volatile. They show that, quite understandably, the enthusiasm is accompanied by uncertainty. That uncertainty reflects the fact that people want to hear the arguments and see the change before they vote.

Let me give an example. Last week the Conservatives announced ideas at their conference that sounded attractive but won't add up. People reacted to that and their poll ratings blipped upwards. But I think that when a sustained argument is put, this blip will disappear.

I decided to listen when the results of recent polls were laid out for me on Friday. They were telling me that people want change, they believe in our leadership, they are impressed by its solidity but they are still not certain.

I am going to do the job this Labour government was elected to do and make them certain. So there will be no election until at least 2009.

Now I am going to get on with the job.

Next question.

Comments

[William]

Daniel, I have a lot of respect for your opinions, but you are getting a bit carried away and - dare I say it - obsessed by what Brown should/ should not have said/ done. It wasn't the opinion polls wot won it. It was the IHT pledge, which made Brown, master strategist that he is, realise that a quick poll would not work; that, on the other hand, a long-drawn-out campaign which would either neutralise or (better) trump Osborne's temporarily winning trick, was now needed. Master-strategist that he is, Irn Broon has successfully flushed out the Conservatives' winning trick. This was his intention back in July (not destabilisation, but flushing out), and it has finally paid off. The price he has to pay for this victory is a few days of ridicule from the conservative media.

[Conand]

You're right of course Danny. Thankfully you aren't a strategist for Brown. Please don't dig out your camping gear and go in his big tent.
I'm on a Conservative PPC's campaign committee. We didn't spend any extra money.
Sorry Gordon et al but your strategic wheeze didn't work in that regard. As a piece of strategy its right up there with the Scotland campaign where the SNP took you to the cleaners.
Now maybe you can get on with being PM, rather than playing political games... ineptly.

[jimmy]

Ahem, volatile polls put the PM off calling a general election? That line would have held for a matter of seconds.

As you said yourself, "next question".

The next questions from the journalists would be much as they were today. For example, "Prime Minister, if the polling had suggested a big Labour lead, wouldn't you have decided to go for it?"

[CAWP]

Still wouldn't have worked.