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Screen shot from BBC North East Or would he follow his normal practice and stand aside? One of the strong messages coming from the Brown camp in the past thirty-six hours is that he would not budge and would fight to the end if challenged. By this they mean, I guess, that anybody wanting to take him on would have to go through all of Labour convoluted process which involves, initially, getting one eight of the parliamentary party to support…

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What’s the point of switching leaders if the ratings won’t go up? I’m still in France with only minimal internet access and have been unable to follow the chain of events that David Miliband’s Guardian article has set off. But one thing is clear – the Foreign Secretary’s action has put what people were talking about privately right onto the public agenda and it’s hard to see any going back. The PM’s aides have always been ferocious in the defence…

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The Prime Minister’s on his way in Israel – how long has the British one got left? Please continue your discussions here – click on the picture for the full article. Double Carpet

“This is less a leadership crisis and more a crisis of existence” In the midst of all the speculation about the Labour leadership, with “Cameron only” now favourite on the next election leaders market, there’s an interesting piece by Iain Martin in the Telegraph today. He argues that a key mistake Labour made was devolving power to Scotland and Wales and thus giving the nationalists credibility in Labour’s “Celtic redoubt”. “Endangered in England’s largest cities, losers in London, out of…

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What do we make of this afternoon’s reports? On a day of apparently fast moving developments over the Labour leadership the main story on the Times website is of plans by Harriet Harman and David Miliband to challenge for the leadership. Earlier the Evening Standard was reporting that “up to 10 junior ministers are willing to resign to force Gordon Brown to stand down, Labour MPs claimed today.” The problem with both reports is their lack of identifiable sources. The…

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Or is he just clutching onto straws? Reflecting, like just about everybody, on Gordon’s future the Independent’s political writer, Steve Richards, makes an assertion in his column today that “all the polls” suggest that the Tory leads are “soft” and that “..there has been no fundamental sea change” and that “as the last year has shown, fortunes can shift dramatically.” I believe that this is a completely wrong interpretation from someone who gives that impression that he is is desperately…

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Glasgow doesn’t seem to have had too much impact The latest Populus Poll for the Times is just out and shows that the Labour deficit has nudged up just two points even though the fieldwork took place during a weekend when the big story was the party leadership and the reaction the the by-election. In a way it does not add much to that we already know – Labour continue to languish in the 20s with the Tories touching the…

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