General Election 2007?

No, I don’t think so – it is always fun to speculate, but I don’t think that Gordon Brown will be going for a snap election this year.

Sure, there is a good case for going to the country early. When (and I think it is a case of when rather than if) Brown wins the premiership, he will experience some sort of uplift in the polls that will not last beyond a brief honeymoon period. Furthermore, by hinting at an early election through the genetically modified squirrel currently chair of the Labour party, Brown et al may finally be able to force Cameron into making some sort of policy pledges – pledges that Labour can either tear apart or (more likely) steal. And the appetite for another change in Prime Minister so soon after Brown grabs the keys to Number 10 may not be there with the British people. He *could* win a narrow victory later this year, and the chance to gain his own mandate (which would allow him to drag the party away from Blairism) may prove to be irresistible.

But I don’t think it will happen. I think Brown will wait, and in doing so will allow the Labour party to continue its’ decline from exhausted husk of a party into an unelectable, squabbling mess. Like the Tories between 1992 and 1997.

The reasons are simple – first off, it looks like Brown will have to fight for the Labour party leadership. All indications are this will not be a coronation. He will lose votes from the left owing to the rogue campaign of John McDonnell. But this is nothing to the New Labour challenge – most likely, given his recent speech about New Labour sticking with Blairism – to come from Clubber Reid. I don’t think that McDonnell stands a snowball’s chance in hell of getting anywhere in the election, and I equally don’t think that the Labour party is ready to elect a wannabe-macho thug to the Premiership just yet. However, this much seems clear to me – Brown will have to fight a brutal campaign to get to Number 10, and will emerge from said campaign battered and bruised. His party will be divided and split into warring factions. He will want to take some time to try to repair the wounds inflicted by the leadership contest. Labour is behind in the polls now – after they have finished tearing themselves apart in order to chose the next PM, they will be even further behind. Brown runs the risk of emerging as a compromise (and compromised) candidate – like Alec Douglas-Home, or John Major.

Furthermore, to fight a good General Election campaign you need an army of foot soldiers – people willing to go out and tramp the streets for you. The Labour party – by the admission of their own MPs – is facing a membership crisis. As a new leader and as one who is (in theory) much closer to old Labour, Brown might be able to reverse the decline in membership and have a good volunteer work force ready to fight for him in a couple of year’s time.

Also, there may be change in the leaders of the other two parties in the next 18 months. Ming the Merciful’s position looks far from secure, and his recent pleas of “I’m in charge” only fuel my feelings that he could be on the way out. And whilst it maybe wishful thinking on my part, there are increasingly audible rumblings from within the Conservative party about the direction Cameron is dragging the Tories in. By waiting Brown does run the risk of the Lib Dems finding a charismatic leader and also runs the risk of Cameron becoming more popular, but he can also hope that infighting in both the Tories and the Lib Dems will deflect from the ever present threat of civil war within the Labour party.

However the main reason is because a snap election would not gain the approval of one of the most influential figures in British Politics – no, not Tony Blair, or Michael Howard or even the Queen, but rather Rupert Murdoch. And he has already warned that he might switch his support to Cameron, and would feel cheated if Brown went straight to the country. As The Scotsman reports, he has said:

“But for no reason other than the dynamics of British politics, we would like to see at least a year to 18 months' stand-off between Gordon Brown and David Cameron so we can decide which of those most coincides with our views. I think the British public would be cheated if they only got a month or two's warning."

And Brown cannot afford to lose the support of the Murdoch Empire if he is to win an election.

So my prediction for 2007 – there will be no General Election, simply because Brown will not risk losing the crown he has waited so long for. He will take the gamble, and hold onto his beloved Premiership until at least 2008, if not 2009.