Screen shot from the Daily Politics

What’ll be the polling impact of today’s media blitz?

It has been very hard over the past eight or nine hours to avoid Gordon Brown. He’s gone from one TV or radio studio to another doing a big series of interviews to try to seize back the initiative.

But will it have helped in the polls and at the Crewe and Nantwich by election? How will all this be going down with the public. Put bluntly is a Brown appearance a net vote winner or vote loser for Labour?

The problem he’s got is his style and his tendency to deny he’s said things even things, like on Adam Boulton this morning, which were played back to him. The danger is that these appearances just feed the media narrative. Brown’s in pickle; Brown gives away nearly £3bn; Brown feels the need to go everywhere to put his case.

Sometimes just being out of the spotlight can help. Maybe two or three weeks when there are hardly any public appearances might just take the steam out of the story.

This would also create space for some of his top team to improve their media skills by being able to talk themselves about the developments in their areas. The fact that it is only Gordon that makes the announcements just reinforces the perception that he’s a control freak.

With a bit of luck there should be an avalanche of polls in the next two to three days – maybe even something more from Crewe & Nantwich. These might give us a better picture of how the Brown fight-back is playing with the public.

Mike Smithson