This is Secretary of State Jim Murphy's 10.20pm response to the claim that he was one of six cabinet members Hewitt and Hoon believed would back a bid to unseat Gordon Brown as leader
“This is a distraction from the important work of protecting jobs and working towards the economic recovery. This is particularly important in Scotland where the SNP government are just not doing enough.”
I'm sitting here waiting for the SNP to lovebomb the inbox of Scottish journalists with their own reaction.
Wednesday, 6 January 2010
Plotters throw snowballs at cabinet
Tailspinning out of a dramatic day comes this at 10pm:
Last night, as the opposition played up the divisions in Labour, Scottish Secretary Jim Murphy and Douglas Alexander, the International Development Minister, were claimed to be among six cabinet members that the coup plotters believed would be sympathetic to their cause.
BBC Political Editor Nick Robinson, a man hotwired to Westminster, said the plotters - by which he meant Hoon and Hewitt had named six cabinet members they believed would be ready to back a bid to get rid of Brown.
The other cabinet members named by the BBC as potential supporters of a coup were Harriet Harman, David Miliband, Bob Ainsworth, and Jack Straw, who led the eventual rebuttal of the rebellion yesterday afternoon
“It is frankly ludicrous to say this,” said a spokesman for the Scottish Secretary last night. “Mr Murphy said at 2pm that this was a distraction."
Earlier Mr Murphy emphasised that the party should focus on economic recovery and not a leadership ballot and that they should fight the Tories not each other. (An seo air blog Niall)
The six are an unlikely, cross-factional combination but, like an Agatha Christie novel, each would be armed with a motive to get even with their boss. The reasons are too byzantine to get into and don't really add to much credibility to the claims.
More interesting perhaps are Eric Joyce's reflections on the day. Let's see if Lord Mandelson has made it through the snow to the Newsnight studio?
Last night, as the opposition played up the divisions in Labour, Scottish Secretary Jim Murphy and Douglas Alexander, the International Development Minister, were claimed to be among six cabinet members that the coup plotters believed would be sympathetic to their cause.
BBC Political Editor Nick Robinson, a man hotwired to Westminster, said the plotters - by which he meant Hoon and Hewitt had named six cabinet members they believed would be ready to back a bid to get rid of Brown.
The other cabinet members named by the BBC as potential supporters of a coup were Harriet Harman, David Miliband, Bob Ainsworth, and Jack Straw, who led the eventual rebuttal of the rebellion yesterday afternoon
“It is frankly ludicrous to say this,” said a spokesman for the Scottish Secretary last night. “Mr Murphy said at 2pm that this was a distraction."
Earlier Mr Murphy emphasised that the party should focus on economic recovery and not a leadership ballot and that they should fight the Tories not each other. (An seo air blog Niall)
The six are an unlikely, cross-factional combination but, like an Agatha Christie novel, each would be armed with a motive to get even with their boss. The reasons are too byzantine to get into and don't really add to much credibility to the claims.
More interesting perhaps are Eric Joyce's reflections on the day. Let's see if Lord Mandelson has made it through the snow to the Newsnight studio?
Plot melting away
I've gone through a list of all the cabinet members and Harriet Harman and David Miliband, the two most likely to take over from Gordon Brown, have still to add their names in support.
There was a hiatus this afternoon, while people were watching and waiting, when the big beasts could have moved. That it took them so long to endorse Mr Brown indicates that there was a wobble inside the cabinet.
Oh - Harman has just issued a statement of support and a "friend" of David Miliband has said this is not going anywhere. It's all over then at 6.18pm. The Snow Plot has been a slushy coup.
How different it could all have been in tomorrow's headlines. As Kevin Mcguire points out over at the Mirror - Brown brilliant at Question Time, a Sun poll (the Sun mark you) showing the gap narrowing and the Spectator cover (the Spectator mark you) mocking Cameron for having no policies of his own. Instead it's coup and counter-plot with Mandelson still to put all the children to bed on Newsnight later.
Is Gordon Brown the unluckiest politician of his generation? You bet.
There was a hiatus this afternoon, while people were watching and waiting, when the big beasts could have moved. That it took them so long to endorse Mr Brown indicates that there was a wobble inside the cabinet.
Oh - Harman has just issued a statement of support and a "friend" of David Miliband has said this is not going anywhere. It's all over then at 6.18pm. The Snow Plot has been a slushy coup.
How different it could all have been in tomorrow's headlines. As Kevin Mcguire points out over at the Mirror - Brown brilliant at Question Time, a Sun poll (the Sun mark you) showing the gap narrowing and the Spectator cover (the Spectator mark you) mocking Cameron for having no policies of his own. Instead it's coup and counter-plot with Mandelson still to put all the children to bed on Newsnight later.
Is Gordon Brown the unluckiest politician of his generation? You bet.
4pm and still on a knife edge
After 4pm and darkness is falling across London, but the Ice Coup is not over yet. Shaun Woodward and Ed Balls have been out in support of the Prime Minister but these are officers that would go down with the ship rather than see Gordon Brown replaced.
Other Ministers have not been out to back up Mr Brown and that gives rise to the suspision that they are still deciding how to react.
Courage is the only thing that is missing from the atmosphere in Westminster this afternoon. Senior members of the cabinet - let's name them: Mandelson, Straw, Miliband, Darling - have to the guts to either stop this or dip their hands in blood.
Other Ministers have not been out to back up Mr Brown and that gives rise to the suspision that they are still deciding how to react.
Courage is the only thing that is missing from the atmosphere in Westminster this afternoon. Senior members of the cabinet - let's name them: Mandelson, Straw, Miliband, Darling - have to the guts to either stop this or dip their hands in blood.
The Ice Plot thickens
Coming up to 3pm in the Polar Plot. Shaun Woodward, a former Tory now Northern Ireland Minister is on TV defending Mr Brown. Is that the best they can do, we ask? He's actually booked on to speak about Northern Ireland anyway.
Woodward has a point - the country will be simply astonished (and probably dismayed) at the behaviour of the plotters.
Brown's convoy has just left the Commons after two hours and fifteen minutes of what is being described as crisis talks, by the Standard's Paul Waugh.
In other swirling news...as the snowflakes fall etc (take in colour)..Jack Straw is said to be ready to lead the rebuttal operation and Peter Mandelson is due on Newsnight tonight. I had planned to go to the cinema, but hey ho.
Woodward has a point - the country will be simply astonished (and probably dismayed) at the behaviour of the plotters.
Brown's convoy has just left the Commons after two hours and fifteen minutes of what is being described as crisis talks, by the Standard's Paul Waugh.
In other swirling news...as the snowflakes fall etc (take in colour)..Jack Straw is said to be ready to lead the rebuttal operation and Peter Mandelson is due on Newsnight tonight. I had planned to go to the cinema, but hey ho.
Lunchtime comes and goes and no cabinet minister on the airwaves
Still no sign of a cabinet minister on TV saying "I love Gordon" and it has now gone two o'clock? Where are they?
This lunchtime has been the witching hour, the cabinet have to decide to stand by their desks or join the rebels.
By six pm the BBC should have rounded them all up and this putsch will be over and we can move on to discussing how low Labour's poll rating can go, or the ball will be on the slates.
What happens then? There is no mechanism for a referendum on Gordon Brown's leadership. Labour elects leaders through an electoral college of trade unions, party members and politicians so this Hoon/Hewitt move could be dismissed out of hand.
There could be challenge to Tony Lloyd though, the chair of the parliamentary Labour party, at any time and his heavy defeat at the hands of a Kamakazi rebel candidate would be a symbolic message for Gordon Brown.
Number Ten are said to be relaxed (ha!) and feel that some Blairites have simply lost the plot completely. Gordon's old spin doctor Charlie Wheelan, looked equally at ease as he watched Patricia Hewitt explaining on Sky TV that this was not a coup attempt(Nice Harris Tweed coat by the way, Charlie).
Journalists and pundits queuing up for the camera but no sign of Peter. Come on Lord Mandelson, bring Act 1 to a dramatic climax.
This lunchtime has been the witching hour, the cabinet have to decide to stand by their desks or join the rebels.
By six pm the BBC should have rounded them all up and this putsch will be over and we can move on to discussing how low Labour's poll rating can go, or the ball will be on the slates.
What happens then? There is no mechanism for a referendum on Gordon Brown's leadership. Labour elects leaders through an electoral college of trade unions, party members and politicians so this Hoon/Hewitt move could be dismissed out of hand.
There could be challenge to Tony Lloyd though, the chair of the parliamentary Labour party, at any time and his heavy defeat at the hands of a Kamakazi rebel candidate would be a symbolic message for Gordon Brown.
Number Ten are said to be relaxed (ha!) and feel that some Blairites have simply lost the plot completely. Gordon's old spin doctor Charlie Wheelan, looked equally at ease as he watched Patricia Hewitt explaining on Sky TV that this was not a coup attempt(Nice Harris Tweed coat by the way, Charlie).
Journalists and pundits queuing up for the camera but no sign of Peter. Come on Lord Mandelson, bring Act 1 to a dramatic climax.
Slushy coup underway - latest from the lobby corridor
Today I was going to write about Teresa May's red suede boots, slush on the pavements in London (big news story that) and Gordon Brown's quite good performance at Prime Minister's questions but - hold page 6 - a coup is underway in the Commons.
Patricia Hewitt and Geoff Hoon, two ex-Blairite Ministers have launched a bid to have a secret ballot on Gordon Brown's leadership. The coup was launched at 12.15 by twitter and text, halfway through Question Time. By then David Cameron had sat down and it was only the blackberrys being passed around the Conservative benches and the swift exit of the Prime Minister's spokesman from the press gallery that alerted us.
The lobby was virtually empty when we got down there and the odd Labour rebel left didn't think this latest (too late?) attempt would amount to anything more than a pile of slush.
The rumours about cabinet resignations and Mandelson's fall out with Downing Street started the moment the Commons returned yesterday. Apparently Brown knew about it just before mid-day when he stood up and gave a super-charged performance at the dispatch box.
Hewitt is on the World at One just now calling for all labour MPs to have a secret ballot. I paraphrase: "If the ballot produces a clear statement of support then those who call from him to go will just have to shut up and get behind him, and we would get united behind him going into the election."
"We're not calling on Gordon to go," she's said. That will raise a gallows laugh in Number Ten. "This is not an attempted coup, this is an attempt to get this sorted once and for all, and then make sure we get rid of this backbiting and concentrate our fire on the hollowness of Cameron and the Conservatives."
What a gift for the opposition, they just have to write a thank you note to the plotters. Angus Roberston, SNP leader, has just been in here calling it all a "Kamakazi car crash". Rebel Labour MPs even think this will end strengthening Brown and the cabinet, none of whom have the courage to walk out and take Mr Brown on openly. The consensus is that the moment passed when James Purnell walked out last summer.
What will probably emerge is Brown strengthened, exactly what the Tories want because every opinion poll tells them that Labour can't win with Brown as leader.
People to watch - apart from the promised press conference later - are Peter Mandelson who will either save him or bury him in the next 24 hours. Keep your eye on Downing Street, oh and on Harriet Harman I'd say.
Bet Mr Brown is glad he didn't start his tour of the south of England today after all.
Patricia Hewitt and Geoff Hoon, two ex-Blairite Ministers have launched a bid to have a secret ballot on Gordon Brown's leadership. The coup was launched at 12.15 by twitter and text, halfway through Question Time. By then David Cameron had sat down and it was only the blackberrys being passed around the Conservative benches and the swift exit of the Prime Minister's spokesman from the press gallery that alerted us.
The lobby was virtually empty when we got down there and the odd Labour rebel left didn't think this latest (too late?) attempt would amount to anything more than a pile of slush.
The rumours about cabinet resignations and Mandelson's fall out with Downing Street started the moment the Commons returned yesterday. Apparently Brown knew about it just before mid-day when he stood up and gave a super-charged performance at the dispatch box.
Hewitt is on the World at One just now calling for all labour MPs to have a secret ballot. I paraphrase: "If the ballot produces a clear statement of support then those who call from him to go will just have to shut up and get behind him, and we would get united behind him going into the election."
"We're not calling on Gordon to go," she's said. That will raise a gallows laugh in Number Ten. "This is not an attempted coup, this is an attempt to get this sorted once and for all, and then make sure we get rid of this backbiting and concentrate our fire on the hollowness of Cameron and the Conservatives."
What a gift for the opposition, they just have to write a thank you note to the plotters. Angus Roberston, SNP leader, has just been in here calling it all a "Kamakazi car crash". Rebel Labour MPs even think this will end strengthening Brown and the cabinet, none of whom have the courage to walk out and take Mr Brown on openly. The consensus is that the moment passed when James Purnell walked out last summer.
What will probably emerge is Brown strengthened, exactly what the Tories want because every opinion poll tells them that Labour can't win with Brown as leader.
People to watch - apart from the promised press conference later - are Peter Mandelson who will either save him or bury him in the next 24 hours. Keep your eye on Downing Street, oh and on Harriet Harman I'd say.
Bet Mr Brown is glad he didn't start his tour of the south of England today after all.
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