Doomed?

No not a Swine flu story but a question about whether or not Labour are doomed. For the past couple of weeks the news has been relentlessly bad for Gordon Brown and Labour, but today we have a number of stories about impending doom.

The Evening Standard has this story, with a number of Labour MP's being rather less than Optimistic.

But the Guardian is, as usual, more guarded but none the less not particularly optimistic. It points out

I remember the last three years of John Major's premiership and stories about his party losing faith in him became – rightly – a regular feature of political news coverage. These stories often featured on-the-record comments from the "usual suspects" because the people who mattered did not want to be quoted. The same thing is happening again now. Brown doesn't need to worry about Marshall-Andrews, Livingstone or Clarke. But he does need to worry that they are getting airtime because the media has decided they have got a point.

So this could be a long slow death but we at least know we have a final date next year when Labour must go to the country. Hopefully with Labour now in the betting to get less than 20% in the upcoming Euro elections the Men in Grey suits may do their job and get rid Gordon.

The final line in the Guardian article is particularly relevant

There's another type of story that crops up when a leader is in trouble and, from the Press Association news wire, I see that we're getting one of these this evening. Harriet Harman "will call for party unity in a speech in Scotland tonight". This is confirmation that things really are pretty bad; politicians don't appeal for unity when it already exists.

This hits the nail on the head. If there is no unity (and Unite!) then Labour will be doomed.


Is Labour now doomed? | Politics | guardian.co.uk