Portrait of the Week – 18 February 2006

Mr Gordon Brown, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, began speaking about all sorts of things outside his ministerial responsibility: security, identity cards, patriotism, a proposed Veterans’ Day each 27 June. The phrase ‘dual premiership’ came up in a question put by the Observer to Mr Charles Clarke, the Home Secretary; in answer to which he said, ‘That’s what Tony would always want, what Gordon should do.’ Mr Brown had met something of a reverse when a by-election at Dunfermline and West Fife, the constituency in which he has a house and in which he spent some time campaigning, resulted in a 16 per cent swing from Labour to the Liberal Democrats, whose candidate Willie Rennie overturned a Labour majority of 11,562 to win a majority of 1,800, with 12,391 votes. The government rejoiced, despite 20 Labour MPs voting against it, at winning a Commons vote on identity cards, making registration of iris-readings compulsory for those who apply for a new passport.