At least Gordon's coronation avoids the ridiculous situation where the unions end up with a critical choice in who will be the next Prime Minister.
Now that Brown has no competition for the leadership a nation (OK, a tiny proportion) will turn its eyes to the Deputy leadership selection race. This looks like it might shape up to be the proxy for the national debate on Labour's future that the leadership race should have been.
And the debate might - if it somehow catches fire, and Cruddas is surely best placed to deliver that - become more interesting than all but the most eye-catching of Brown's pronouncements. Why? Because whizzy announcements from the top have become rather too much part of the Blairite background. Something genuinely exciting from the Deputy Leadership debate may wake things up - with 6 candidates playing it safe will not wash.
And who knows - we might even end up with a Deputy Leader with a far stronger mandate from the Party than Gordon Brown.
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Tim Gordon was educated at a London comprehensive before studying at Cambridge and overseas. He has been a teacher, a strategy consultant and works in the media. An active Liberal Democrat since the party started, he worked in Parliament for David Steel, ran for Parliament in Rotherham in 2005 and is now a local activist.
1 comment:
Tim, its almost a relief that Brown has at last just been handed the keys to No. 10 without so much as a wimper from the rank and file Labour Party members. Its been really boring!
I think Jon Cruddas is the one to watch because he is saying something different, and will attract votes from disgruntled armchair members and the Unions. I knew Jon years ago in my Labour Party days. He has worked for the Party for years, and was then Tony Blair's 'fixer' in No 10, before winning his seat in Dagenham. He's shifted his position away from Blair since then.
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