Tom Brown: What if... the Labour rebels had forced a general election?

Published on Saturday 26 April 2008 19:48

A new political get-out has been born: synchronised blinking

DRAMATIC u-turn, humiliating climbdown, pathetic cave-in, massive loss of authority – or a "listening" Prime Minister making the right long-term decision? Take your pick. But there was another element in the retreat by 40-plus Labour MPs who were on the verge of open rebellion last week: the fear factor.

In the days before Gordon Brown made his concessions to those hurt by the withdrawal of the 10p tax rate (without admitting he had got his sums wrong), Government whips and No 10 emissaries put the frighteners on backbenchers: do you want a general election right now, when the opinion polls are so bad? How many of you will lose your seats?

The rebels were told that for a government to lose a key Budget vote was a confidence issue. The Prime Minister took it so seriously that he would have to go to the country. In any case, the Tories and Lib Dems would force him into an election by saying he had lost all authority.

Behind the scenes, Downing Street were parleying with Frank Field, the extremely effective leader of the awkward squad and not a man to argue with on social security. What makes him more awkward than most is that he is a deeply spiritual man whose moral compass is every bit as unwavering as Brown's, as is his commitment on poverty and income redistribution. He may appear annoying and self-righteous but he had the clout (and the support of enough fellow MPs) to go eyeball to eyeball with the Prime Minister – and the nerve to tell him that the ideal solution would be if they both blinked at the same moment. Thus a new political get-out was born: synchronised blinking.

The rebellion was called off and, with it, the possibility of an election – for the moment. It can now be dismissed as a desperate threat but some left-wingers were muttering about having the leadership election they did not have last year and at least one respected commentator wrote of a scenario in which "Brown could be ousted in days".

There is a school of writing called 'alternate history' – what if Hitler had won the war in Europe and occupied Britain, for example? What if the Russians had rained nuclear missiles down on the West? Or if the US had a fascist President – not anyone we know, you understand; it's the basis of Philip Roth's recent and riveting The Plot Against America.

So, what if the rebellion had forced Brown's hand? It is worth speculating, if only to remind ourselves of the awful alternatives. To coin a phrase, things can only get worse – much worse than the present plight of a PM tacitly having to admit his mistakes and re-re-relaunch his stuttering premiership.

Would Brown step down and trigger a Labour leadership battle between young bloods David Miliband and Ed Balls, the increasingly credible Alan Johnson or an older hand like Jack Straw? No chance. A bitterly fought bloodbath would be the worst possible prelude to a general election campaign and, for all his faults, Brown would still outshine such lesser lights. More likely, he would use the election to prove his staying power and seek a stronger mandate for himself.

If you believe the opinion polls, an immediate election would be a Tory walkover. The latest YouGov sample, taken between Monday and Wednesday when the tax furore was at its height, gave the Tories their biggest lead since Maggie Thatcher's heyday in 1987; David Cameron would stroll into No 10 with a comfortable 50-seat majority.

Labour shrug off that prediction as utterly unrealistic, mainly because they cannot believe the electorate will vote for Cameron and Co once they have been exposed as opportunists grabbing whatever passes on the political wind. Cameron can work himself into a phoney fury on issues like the 10p tax rate, but so far there are no policies or substantial solutions. Prime Minister Cameron, Chancellor George Osborne, Foreign Secretary William Hague, Scottish Secretary David Mundell (an object of derision in his own party) and a Cabinet of Hoorah Henrys, Waffling Willies and sundry twits? Better stick with what we have, goes the argument.

The most likely outcome at the next UK election, either now or in two years, is a hung Westminster. Despite Alex Salmond's braggadocio that the SNP would hold the balance of power and "make Westminster dance to a Scots jig", in fact the Lib Dems would be key, in a coalition. Imagine that – and remember what a feeble form of government it produced in Scotland. Disillusion is in the electoral air and dissatisfied voters are saying "a pox on all your parties". Typical was my neighbour in his early 60s, one of the losers in the 10p debacle, who said: "I know David Cameron won't do the likes of me any favours but I'll never vote Labour again."

Sooner rather than later, from a hung UK Parliament will emerge a radical realignment of British politics with rumps of the existing parties and a new left-of-centre party. Since it cannot be called the Social Democrat Party without reviving memories of the gruesome Gang of Four of the 1980s, call it the Social Justice Party or the POP (the Pee-ed-off People's Party) but it will bring sanity, instead of opportunism, back to mainstream politics.

Meanwhile, if Labour has a disaster at next week's local elections down south, the pressure on Brown will become intense and left-wing discontents, fainthearts and bitter Blairites will increase their calls for a change of leader. Brown's impulse will be to tough it out and give himself two years to win back the party and the voters. But "what if…?"