Royal Mail vote could deal fatal blow to Gordon Brown

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Royal Mail vote could deal fatal blow to Gordon Brown's authority

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David Cameron holds Gordon Brown’s political life in his hands after the Prime Minister’s decision to risk a Commons defeat over the Royal Mail sell-off next month, senior government figures believe.

Downing Street insisted last night that Mr Brown was determined to press ahead, despite weekend reports that he was preparing to shelve reforms championed by Lord Mandelson, the Business Secretary.

His decision sets him at odds with his long-term ally Nick Brown, the Chief Whip, who has warned the Prime Minister that he has little or no chance of getting the measure through without Tory support.

With Labour acknowledging that it faces the “most challenging” polls for at least 16 years in the European and council elections on June 4, Mr Brown knows that he can ill afford another Commons defeat after days dominated by renewed speculation over his leadership.

Harriet Harman, Labour’s Deputy Leader, denied preparing to mount a challenge, saying yesterday that there were no circumstances under which she would stand for the leadership. “I do not want to be Prime Minister, I do not want to be leader of the party,” she said.

Her intervention appeared to be part of efforts to restore Cabinet discipline after Hazel Blears, the Communities Secretary, appeared to include Mr Brown’s YouTube video in a list of “lamentable failures” by the Government in putting its message across.

In an indication of the increasingly factionalised nature of the governing party, calls for Ms Blears to be punished were led by Lindsay Hoyle and Geraldine Smith, MPs at the head of the looming Royal Mail rebellion.

More than 150 Labour members have registered their opposition to a deal under which the Government plugs a £7-billion pensions shortfall in return for a partial sell-off.

A so-called “John Lewis” concession under which Royal Mail workers would be handed a share of the reformed business was dismissed as “not nearly enough” by one senior government figure last night. “There is no chance of turning around opinion in the party if the proposals remain in their current form,” the Labour figure said.

For their part, Government supporters of the measure are growing irritated at the whips’ failure to do more to win support for the sell-off. One minister agreed that it appeared that Nick Brown was “sitting on his hands”.

Alan Johnson, the Health Secretary and a former head of the postal workers’ union, is supportive but is said to be reluctant to be used to “sell” the reforms.

Mr Cameron must decide whether to allow Labour rebels to deal another, possibly fatal, blow to Mr Brown’s authority when the measures reach the Commons.

A Conservative spokesman indicated last night that the Tories, although concerned with some aspects, remained broadly in favour of the sell-off. But senior ministers say that Mr Cameron will be tempted to find common cause with the Labour rebels and inflict a humiliating defeat. Although they will most likely vote with the Government at Second Reading next month, the Tories are suspected of planning to switch sides at the later report stage.

Mr Brown will seek today to regain the initiative by outlining plans to give parents powers to trigger changes to secondary school provision. The proposals, contained in a White Paper to be published next month, build on existing powers for dissatisfied parents to trigger an Ofsted inspection.

The Prime Minister will seek to draw a contrast with Conservative plans that encourage parents to set up their own institutions.

Downing Street insiders insisted last night that Ms Harman had not been asked to rule herself out of running for the Labour leadership.

During her tour of television studios, Ms Harman said she did not believe that Mr Brown would be forced from the leadership. “There is not going to be a leadership election. There should not be, and there will not be,” she said.

On the BBC Breakfast programme Ms Harman grabbed a pen from the presenter, Jon Kay, and amended the front page headline on a copy of The Daily Telegraph to read “Harman: I’d NOT fight for leadership”.

She insisted that there was no “policy divide” within Labour and that there was “strong unity” over what was being done to tackle the economic crisis as members prepared for next month’s local and European elections.

She said: “I think that this is a distraction and Labour Party members want us all to be getting on with the job which the country needs us to be doing, which is fighting these elections and also fighting to protect the economy and jobs and that is absolutely what I am doing.”

She insisted that Ms Blears had already backtracked over her Observer article, which followed Mr Brown’s first Commons defeat — over settlement rights for Gurkhas — since entering No 10 and a double climbdown on reform of MPs’ expenses.

Hilary Benn, the Environment Secretary, told GMTV that there would “absolutely not” be a leadership challenge and Mr Brown would take the party into the next general election. “Gordon Brown is a serious politician for serious times. At the moment, things have got so frenzied, every dot and comma in articles that people write or things that people say is examined. Frankly, I think we should put the magnifying glass away. This is a time for looking to the future.”

Although the prospect of the local and European elections on June 4 should help Mr Brown to restore unity in the short term, he is vulnerable to a challenge if results are even worse than feared.

A Labour source sought to play down expectations: “This set of elections are the most challenging faced by the Labour Party for electoral structural reasons, never mind the political or economic context, since 1993 or indeed before. The good thing is that they have proved to be inadequate pointers to any subsequent general election results.”

Mr Brown will make his speech on education after a Cabinet meeting at which the need for unity and discipline is expected to be underlined.

Ms Blears, who is suspected by some of the Prime Minister’s allies of seeking to rally support for a challenge in the summer, was forced to apologise for her intervention.

One ally denied that there was, yet, a specific plot to unseat the Prime Minister but said Labour MPs were increasingly disengaging from their leader. “It’s not an operation so much as a tendency,” said the strategist.