Millburn comes out against Brown
By politics.co.uk staff
Gordon Brown need to urgently replace “monologue” with “dialogue” if he wants to retain power, former health secretary Alan Millburn has said.
The dyed-in-wool Blairite is the latest former Cabinet member to criticise the prime minister after a rash of bad headlines in May prompted renewed leadership speculation.
“The old top-down approach to governance will no longer work,” he writes in today’s Independent, citing the example of Barack Obama as one to follow.
“The left must avoid the trap of countering an argument about less state by making a case for more state.
“The job of progressives is not to kill capitalism but to civilise it – by making it work in the public interest.”
Mr Millburn follows David Blunkett and Charles Clarke, both former home secretaries, in publicly voicing discontent with the current government performance.
During yesterday’s prime minister’s question, Tory leader David Cameron focussed on the internal tension within Labour – citing hazel Blear’s ‘YouTube if you want to’ article as a particular example.
“You are completely out of your depth when it comes to the big issues,” the prime minister retorted.
