No choice for Labour

The Times has a Leader today asking if the result of the Euro Elections will be the final chance for the Labour Party to dump Gordon Brown. It asks

The Labour party is about to suffer a serious electoral defeat. The Cabinet now has a big decision to make - whether or not to act.

The problem is that Labour knows that it has gone past the point of hoping that dumping its leader will enable then to be voted in by the public.The public has had it with Labour, regardless of whether it is Gordon Brown or one of his lackeys that is running the party, why would one of the current Cabinet want to take on this fatally poisoned chalice. Labour under Gordon Brown have managed, yet again, to do what Labour always does and bring this country to the verge of Bankruptcy. As usual it will have to be the Conservatives who have to supply the medicine, a medicine that yet again will not taste very good, but has to be taken to allow us to no longer be the sick man of Europe.

Gordon will continue doing what he does best, building lists of what he thinks we should do, with no reference to anyone else, as only Gordon knows how to save the World. The Times gives a clue to why Gordon is currently bunkered away pretending to be Macavity rather than out in the real world. According to the Times he is

...already working on how he plans to respond. Mr Brown is said to be weighing his options for a Cabinet reshuffle, discussing plans for political reform and putting the finishing touches to a national plan in the hope that he can restart the conversation about economic recovery.

In reality what Gordon is doing is trying to save his skin until next May when he finally has to have an election, one he knows he cannot win. Then and only then will he relinquish power as he, as the saviour of world, cannot face defeat.

As the Times puts it.

Of course, Cabinet members may choose not to act. This would involve closing ranks around Mr Brown on the ground that economic recovery will provide a political dividend. This would mean making an honest judgment that, for themselves, for their colleagues in the PLP, for the reputation of the Labour Party and for the sake of good government, they truly believe that Mr Brown offers the best leadership. It is hard to believe, for anyone familiar with the mood of Cabinet and senior Labour advisers, that they think that Mr Brown can deliver the best possible result for the party at the general election.

The question is now whether any of them is prepared to act. For a long while they have steadfastly maintained, at least in public, that the cost of removing the Prime Minister from office was greater than the benefit. Perhaps the verdict of the electorate will steel one or more of them to speak the truth about power. But doing nothing is itself a choice. Either way, Labour's future is not just Mr Brown's but the Cabinet's collective responsibility.

So the choice is stark for the Cabinet and any member that wants to be leader, either go for it now and be defeated as Leader or wait until Gordon resigns and still get beaten at the polls.

Not much of a choice but we can at least hope that someone in the Cabinet has the the balls to realise that under Brown we are doomed to even more serious problems, economic and political, and that anyone would be better than having Gordon in charge. They at least could say they tried their best to get us out of the mess that the UK is currently in.

The Choice for Labour -Times Online