Is this the death of another anti-Brown plot?

An eagle-eyed spot by Hopi Sen, who has posted on Barry Sheerman’s comments in the Huddersfield Examiner today.  If you remember, Sheerman was mooted as a key component in an anti-Brown plot, whereby he’d stand as chair of the Parliamentary Labour Party on a Get Gordon Out platform. Votes for Sheerman, it was thought, would be votes against Brown – and increase the pressure on the PM to stand down.  But in the Huddersfield Examiner, Sheerman suggests that, while he will stand for the PLP position, he won’t do so as part of a coup:

“…Mr Sheerman denied this was part of a move to topple Gordon Brown.

He said “If colleagues ask me to stand I will consider it. A lot of people believe that the current chair has not been robust enough standing up for backbenchers and has rather too easily taken the view of the government.

I was very unhappy with the way the current chair of the PLP didn’t stand up for backbenchers”

Now, Sheerman is hardly a friend of Brown’s – so votes for him could still be regarded as anti-Brown votes – but this does rather sound like the end of another plot.