Gordon Brown Bottling Out of Calling a UK General Election As It All Goes Wrong

By: Nadeem_Walayat

Gordon would have thought the way he handled the series of crisis since taking over as Prime Minister barely 100 days ago would have adhered him to the British Electorate, ensuring him of a swift general election victory.

He had to contend with

• The Glasgow failed Terror Attacks
• The worst floods in over 100 years in many populated parts of England
• Return of Foot and Mouth and to be lately joined by blue tongue
• Global Credit Crunch sparked by the US Housing bust.
• Northern Rock Bank Bust - As a direct consequence of the credit crunch. This was the first failure of a UK bank in 140 years.

Up until a week ago Gordon Brown was riding high in the polls, comforted by a series of polls suggesting a lead over the conservatives of some 11%, more than enough to ensure a landslide victory.

So where did things start to go wrong ?

• Gordon Browns electioneering visit to Iraq, and his false statements of 1000 troops coming home before December, the fact is that NO extra troops will be coming home. As the announcement refers to 500 troops already out of Iraq and 500 troops that were destined to go to Iraq. Miss-informing the electorate on the eve of an Election is a big mistake!
• Tory Tax Cuts - Cameron's Tory part threw in the towel with regards budgeting and financial competence and promised huge tax cuts in the form of raising the threshold on the highly unpopular Inheritance Tax to £1,000,000. It does not matter that the costing of which is highly bogus, what mattered were headlines which implied a clear difference between the Tories, a Tax cutting party and Labour a Tax Raising Party.
• NHS Announcement - Basically the public have lost confidence in the running of the NHS, they have seen a tripling in budgets resulting in little increase in output. GP's awarding themselves obscene 30% annual pay deals when the extra funding was meant for improving patient healthcare. Therefore ironically the public have warmed to a more austere approach to the NHS that the Tories would represent. I.e. to re-negotiate GP contracts so that they cut back on playboy lifestyles and spend more time in the surgery diagnosing patients.

Gordon Brown is gradually blowing an opportunity to get elected with an huge landslide because he is trying to be a Tony Blair, when he is not ! He needs to be decisive and cut the spin, both of which had stood him well during his first 3 months. The dithering over the calling of the election has hurt him in the polls and will likely continue to do as fridays polls show barely a 3% lead down from 11% just a week ago!

He needs to announce one way or another with near immediate effect! Whether or not there will be an Election in November. As every single day that he delays is costing him votes. However, should he call an election on Monday then likely it will be followed by a bounce in the polls from the current picture which is as a result of perceived indecision.

By Nadeem Walayat
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