Wednesday, May 16, 2007

Gordon Brown: No contest, no debate

So it's going to be a coronation:

Gordon Brown has secured the backing of enough MPs to ensure he will not face a contest to become the next Labour leader and prime minister.

Mr Brown has 308 nominations prompting his only rival, left-winger John McDonnell, to concede. He was 16 nominations short of the 45 required.

Mr McDonnell said he was disappointed on behalf of Labour Party members and it was a "blow to democracy".

I'm no fan of John McDonnell, but I think he is right. The lack of a contest or even a debate will reawaken every doubt that the wider public has ever had about him.

Later. At least Labour has more sense than the Liberal Democrats in one way: their MPs are not allowed to nominate more than one leadership candidate.

2 comments:

Niles said...

Oh, good grief. The news has been tedious enough over the last few weeks, with "PM still resigning / girl still missing / Brown still likely to take over" heading all the bulletins.

If there's not even a challenger do we still get the endless tedium of the Gordon Brown Roadshow for weeks to come? Do the Labour party get a RON ballot?

susan press said...

Diddly squat is what Labour members get. Expect this one to haunt Brown.....good.