His final PMQs before the 2007 recess and the election U-turn

If you’ve got a few minutes just click on the picture above to watch Brown take the last PMQs of July 2007 when everything was going so right for him.

Watching his body language, listening to a very different intonation in his voice, looking at how he dealt with Cameron and it is as though you are in a different era.

He’s relaxed, confident, and delivered very effectively the “old agenda” put-down in response to Cameron’s questions on the EU treaty. There’s none of the shaking hand and no gripping of the dispatch box in front of him.

As well as the extraordinary change in the way Brown now goes through this weekly ordeal when parliament is sitting the amazing thing is the Cameron was able to recover from what was a very difficult three months.

The question you must ask is could Gord get back to his July 2007 self again? With oil prices declining from their peak, the markets possibly having bottomed out and, say, him being able to see off those who are challenging his leadership could there be a transformation?

So much depends on the media narrative. Journalists love a good come-back story. It could happen. And remember Labour only need to get back within 10 points of the Tories in the polls and we are back into hung parliament territory.

My own feeling is that things have gone too far with his own party. The mood for change is very strong and however well things go now the story will be of his fight to keep his job.

Mike Smithson