Britain needs a stable government – and fast

IN FINALLY bowing to what had become inevitable since the early hours of last Friday morning, Gordon Brown cut a dignified figure as he stood alone in Downing Street and announced that he was standing down as Prime Minister and leader of the Labour Party.

That Mr Brown should step aside was not only inevitable, it was also the only decision the Prime Minister could make, for it was on his watch that Labour lost more than 90 seats and was left trailing the Conservatives, led by David Cameron.

It would be churlish not to give Mr Brown some credit for coming to this conclusion as it is often difficult for politicians, particularly one as thrawn as the Prime Minister, to accept what to others is the uncomfortable truth.

Furthermore, it would be remiss not to pay tribute to Mr Brown's achievements as one of the architects of new Labour with Tony Blair and his unprecedented period as chancellor during which the British economy appeared to have avoided the economic cycle of boom and bust.

But in judging Mr Brown we must note that, as he himself has admitted, he was responsible for the regulatory regime which allowed our major banks to plunge into the deep global financial waters that eventually led to the spectacular crash, the recession, and to saddling the country with massive debt and deficit.

It was the recession which undoubtedly contributed to the voters refusing to give Mr Brown his own mandate, and Labour a fourth term, but the election also proved that the British were not convinced by Mr Cameron.

That inconclusive result, leaving the Lib Dems, on 57 seats, as king-makers, led inevitably to yesterday's dramatic events which take the UK into uncharted constitutional territory and cast a dangerous shadow over democracy. Mr Brown has announced not that he is standing down immediately, but that he will remain as Prime Minister while Labour and the Liberal Democrats hold formal talks on forming a possible coalition.

The announcement that the formal talks had begun came while Nick Clegg's party was continuing the discussions with the Conservatives.

News of this will have surprised the Tories, and angered many of their back-benchers, but it was probably not unexpected by the leadership, hence Mr Cameron's offer to the Lib Dems to match Labour's pledge to do a deal on the basis of a referendum on the Alternative Vote (AV) system for elections.

We can expect more offer and counter-offer as Labour and the Tories seek to woo the Lib Dems, but becoming fixated by this unseemly process misses a more fundamental issue. If Labour and the Lib Dems do a deal, the new leader of the Labour Party will become prime minister without having presented himself to the electorate – exactly the problem that Mr Brown had when he succeeded Tony Blair.

As Mr Brown emphasised in Downing Street yesterday, Britain has a parliamentary democracy, not a presidential system, but given the importance of the leaders' debates, the next Labour prime minister would lack legitimacy in the public eye, even if their election was constitutionally sound.

A hung parliament was always going to produce difficult choices for our political leaders, but the process of horse-trading to win the political affections of the Lib Dems – and the deeper problems thrown up by Mr Brown's decision to stand down – are troubling.

One immediate conclusion that we may draw from these events is that it is time that the UK had a more codified, written constitution and the model set down for the Scottish Parliament for time-limited elections of a first minister and the formation of devolved government is a good one.

It should not be possible for a prime minister to cling to power without, at the very least, being forced to go to parliament and face an election. Events yesterday have also reinforced the case for fixed-term parliaments, another innovation in Scotland.

More immediately, however, this country needs a stable government which will begin the painful process of tacking our burgeoning national debt and if we do not get one soon, the markets could take fright, lunging us into even deeper economic difficulty.

Never in the course of modern political history has so much been asked of a few political leaders, two of whom – Mr Cameron and Mr Clegg – have never held office, and it is imperative that they move speedily to form an administration that can govern in the national interest.

If they cannot do so swiftly, then there may another option. Unpalatable as it may be in terms of challenging democratic system, trying the patience of the voters and the cost, we may yet have to have another general election to try to get the country out of this highly unsatisfactory constitutional contortion.