Peter Hoskin

Memo to Brown: before boldness comes unity

Stop sniggering at the back.  I mean, all I asked was whether Gordon Brown can be bold and radical.  The way things are looking, he certainly needs to be – and, according to Philip Webster’s insightful account of yesterday’s three-hour Cabinet meeting, the PM has called on his colleagues to think up as many “eye-catching” proposals as possible for Labour’s manifesto.  One “senior source” says that the party “should have the most radical manifesto yet put to the electorate.”

Which is, of course, much easier said than done – a fact highlighted by another passage in Webster’s report, which reveals:

“Mr Brown said there must be no repeat of last week’s botched coup. The campaign must be not ‘about us and the Labour Party’ but about the public’s priorities. Sources said that the words amounted to an instruction.”

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