Tea in New Mills

Yesterday, a very sad occasion, when we attended the funeral of Tom, Sara’s uncle and my friend, who had died at the cruelly early age of 66.

The funeral was held in the little village of Manafon, hidden away in the heart of a gentle, green Montgomeryshire valley. The small, pretty church was packed full, and scores of mourners had to stand outside and listen to the service relayed to them by loudspeakers. A lot of people had turned out to pay their respects to a kind, intelligent man who was universally liked.

After the service and the burial, we made our way in convoy to the funeral tea in the neighbouring village of New Mills. The village hall was a pre-war, corrugated iron construction, warm in the spring sunshine. Inside, there was tea, bara brith, scones, jam and oodles of cream.

There was also a lot of political talk. People could sense that something really big had happened in the local elections and in London. There had been what John Prescott called a shift of the tectonic plates.

What, they asked, did I think would happen? Would there be an early general election? Would Gordon Brown be toppled?

Well, I told them, I was looking forward to my return to Parliament on Tuesday. Labour MPs, already muttering discontentedly, would start fighting amongst themselves like ferrets in a sack.

And no, I said, I didn’t think Gordon Brown would call an early general election. A turkey, after all, doesn’t call for an early Christmas.

As it turns out, and rather as privately expected, the internecine squabbling within the Labour party has already developed into full-blown conflict, the opening salvos fired in the Sundays.

The Telegraph reports moves among “old guard” Blairites, such as John Reid and Charles Clarke to promote David Miliband as a leadership contender. Clarke himself is:

thought to be ready to "go public" on his thoughts about the failures of Mr Brown's administration in a lecture this week for the pressure group Progress while No 10 insiders are nervously awaiting "follow-up" attacks from other Blairite critics, possibly including Stephen Byers and Alan Milburn, the former cabinet ministers, over the subsequent few days.

Meanwhile, Old Labour left-winger, John McDonnell, MP for Hayes and Harlington, is said to be preparing a “stalking horse" challenge to Brown, knowing that he has little or no chance of winning, but hoping that a vote will prove the catalyst that will hasten the Prime Minister’s departure.

Ominously for Gordon, McDonnell’s web address is http://www.john4leader.org.uk/. His Friday press release, displayed on the website, makes his disapproval of the Labour high command’s “we are listening” line absolutely plain:

After the worse (sic) results in 40 years it is intellectually unsustainable for ministers to simply tell the electorate that the government is listening. Prevarication will only lead to a Tory government. What people want is decisive action to change the policies immediately.

Despite all the fevered talk, however, I don’t think anyone will mount a serious challenge to Gordon, though McDonnell may well damage the PM further by forcing a leadership vote.

Cabinet ministers such as Miliband major, Alan Johnson and James Purnell know that Labour are in a dreadful hole. Macmillan’s “events” may well intervene to rescue them, but short of that, they will limp on for another two years to a likely election defeat. If anyone is to be a lame duck Prime Minister, they would, on the whole, prefer it were Gordon. Leadership issues will be best postponed to the first few months of opposition.

So no, to answer the third question in the New Mills village hall, I don’t think Gordon Brown will be toppled. We have got him until the next general election, whenever that may be.

Not a state of affairs that will, I fear, be good for his health. Nor, what is worse, good for the nation, either.