Welcome

HOME | ARCHIVE | FACTS | QUOTES | COMMENT | CONTACT

What would keep Tony Blair in office past the next party conference?

War with Iran would do it. "At a time of such grave, national peril we cannot allow the uncertainty of a change in leadership . . . etc." Book makers can't calculate the odds; theologians might help.

Question: How large would a domestic terrorist assault have to be for the same effect? Three explosions of the same scale as 7/7 with the promise of more to come? You couldn't run a leadership election amid all that flying glass.

Other contenders? Alan Johnson melted away into the aether (he has never been prime ministerial timber). John Hutton has never been in the running at all. Alan Milburn came across as a parody of Blair (increasingly hard to do). These people will not run. The left running that candidate we've all forgotten about - hia only effect would be to draw a dozen votes from the Chancellor (mind you, every little helps).

No, the only possible candidate, able and willing, is John Reid. The Luntz poll must have shaken Gordon to his shoes. Thirty-odd Labour voters or Labour likelys were asked to vote for the Chancellor. No one put up their hands. None. Nul points! The mediator bullied them (you know how impartial pollsters are). Three reluctantly offered. The presence of Clinton at the conference reminded us. Gordo is Al Gore.

A textual reading of Reid's speech shows how he is positioning himself directly against Gordon. He's man o' the people ("God bless Johnny Walker!"); he has a sense of humour/is capable of laughing at himself (the TUC's offer of death insurance, and the Hattersley joke); he is a natural leader ("play the fullest part in the election"); and most important of all, hw is a team player (Labour "needed to help each other . . . from top to bottom . . . unity of purpose and common endeavour . . .").

But Reid has no friends among MPs, people say. The first poll that shows he will out-perform Gordon as an electoral asset will bring him 100 friends immediately with another 100 on the way. Reid will run and has a better chance of winning than the 5-1 Ladbroke's is offering on him.