Posted on 04/30/2009 10:40:09 PM PDT by bruinbirdman
Labour is heading for an election defeat as heavy as that suffered by John Major because Gordon Brown has lost control of the parliamentary party, two senior Cabinet ministers have privately warned.
The Prime Minister was forced to surrender in his battle to reform MPs’ expenses yesterday after backbenchers threatened to defy his authority for the second time in two days.
The retreat was announced to avert another humiliating loss in the Commons, only 24 hours after the Government was defeated over the right of Gurkhas to live in Britain.
After another day of whips’ desperate bargaining with Labour MPs had failed to produce sufficient support for the Prime Minister, it was left to Harriet Harman, the Leader of the Commons, to announce that reform of the second homes allowance would be left to an independent inquiry.
The turmoil of the past week, following the damage to the Prime Minister over the emails smearing senior Tories, has produced “meltdown” in the parliamentary party according to one minister. Even Mr Brown’s usually loyal Cabinet colleagues are losing patience.
One minister close to Mr Brown told The Daily Telegraph: “We can still turn this round, but Gordon is not listening. He is lashing out and reacting to headlines. It’s all so reminiscent of the last months of John Major.
“If we don’t get our act together — and that means Gordon needs some better advice — we could go down to a defeat every bit as big as, if not bigger than, the Tories in 1997.”
Another Cabinet minister said: “Gordon is looking for someone to blame for the Gurkhas but he refused to see that we were in trouble and did not see it coming. Instead we had the spectacle of the Prime Minister, insisting at the dispatch box at 12.15,
(Excerpt) Read more at telegraph.co.uk ...
Did he ever “have it”?
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