‘Blair memo’ derides Brown’s fatal mistakes
Gordon Brown is facing more pressure today after a leaked memo reportedly written by Tony Blair condemned the “fatal” mistakes of his premiership.
The Mail on Sunday said the memo was written last autumn in the aftermath of the conference season that saw the party’s summer poll gains almost completely eroded.
According to the newspaper Mr Blair writes in the memo, a severely toned down version of which was later sent to his successor as prime minister, of the “fatal” mistake of announcing an end to ‘spin’.
Mr Blair, who won more general elections than any Labour leader before him, said the “lamentable” strategy had played directly into the hands of David Cameron’s Conservatives.
A spokesman for Mr Blair refused to comment directly on the memo but added: “Tony Blair continues to be 100 per cent supportive of Gordon Brown and the government.”
The memo arrives at what appears to be a new nadir for Mr Brown.
Last week his leadership of the party and country was called into question when Labour lost the Glasgow East by-election, while several backbenchers have called for a leadership challenge.
The issue was brought into focus by foreign secretary and Blair protégé David Miliband when in a newspaper article he discussed the party’s future without specifically mentioning Mr Brown.
Mr Brown is expected to reshuffle his Cabinet when he returns from his summer holiday.
But despite the backing of ministers he effectively has up until and including the party conference season to turn his and his party’s fortunes around as Labour support ebbs to its lowest in a generation.
Extracts from the memo obtained by the Mail on Sunday
(GB: Gordon Brown, TB: Tony Blair, NL: New Labour, DC: David Cameron)
“I am passing this message on to GB – not in these terms – and will try to help; but at present, there is every indication that the lessons will not be learnt.
“There has been a lamentable confusion of tactics and strategy. Tactically, it was thought clever to define by reference to TB ie this was not the era of spin, we are going to be honest, the style would change etc.
“Strategically the consequence was twofold: a) we dissed our own record – instead of saying we are building on the achievements, confronting new challenges, we joined in the attack on our own ten years – a fatal mistake if we do not correct it and b) because we were disowning ourselves as a government, we junked the TB policy agenda but had nothing to put in its place.
“So tactically we took the benefit of the anti-TB feeling, but strategically, we ended up accepting our opponents’ propaganda and appearing incapable of articulating a forward policy agenda.
“The real problem was not the brilliance of the Tory conference, but the hubris and vacuity of our own. This meant the Tories, by having something to say on policy, appeared substantial and to represent the future.
“The truth is that DC was in trouble long before TB left, but that was because he was being forced to choose on NL policy and found as a result that he couldn’t differentiate properly. The Tory policy is still not up to much but they are able to get traction on inheritance tax – unbelievably boosted by our own briefing – because otherwise the policy field is left wide open. DC is confused by proper strategy but immensely empowered by short-term tactics.
“The choice is and was always between GB running as the change candidate or as continuity NL. He never needed to worry about distancing on Iraq – it was never going to be seen as his issue; but he really needed to be seen as continuing NL not ditching it. By trying to be change, he played exactly the same game the media wanted but never the game that gives us the only chance of a fourth term.”
