In his interviews this morning Gordon Brown made much of the fact that he has a better team than David Cameron. Adam Boulton put it to him that he had a weak Cabinet. Let's put Brown's claim to the test. If you judge politicians on whether they are people of ideas, adminsitrative ability and have the ability to market their policies to the electorate, let's see who comes out on top.
Gordon Brown v David Cameron
Alistair Darling v George Osborne
Jacqui Smith v David Davis
Des Browne v Liam Fox
Harriet Harman v Theresa May
Hazel Blears v Eric Pickles
Yvette Cooper v Philip Hammond
Ed Balls v Michael Gove
John Denham v David Willetts
Douglas Alexander v Andrew Mitchell
David Miliband v William Hague
Harriet Harman v Caroline Spelman
Andy Burnham v Jeremy Hunt
James Purnell v Chris Grayling
Alan Johnson v Andrew Lansley
Jack Straw v Nick Herbert
Hilary Benn v Peter Ainsworth
John Hutton v Alan Duncan
Geoff Hoon v Patrick McLoughlin
Shaun Woodward v Owen Paterson
Baroness Ashton v Lord Strathclyde
Paul Murphy v Cheryl Gillan
Ruth Kelly v Theresa Villiers
So, out of 23 contests, how many did you award to Labour? Try and put your party allegiance to once side. I did and my score was 5 Labour, 11 Conservative and 7 equal. I defy any Labour supporter to come out with a majority Labour score.
20 comments:
Whch 5 did you score to Labour?
I'm sorry I tried to be objective but I still came up with 23 Conservatives.
The problem being that no matter how talented some of the Labour Ministers may be, it is being totally undermined by the message they have to peddle.
I'm more than sure that more than half of them don't believe the rubbish they are asked to endorse.
In business we try to use weighted scorecards to assess performance. It's not just a matter of how many out of 22 you'd give one way or the other.
If you apportion an importance weighting to certain key posts and also a relative score for performance (a bit better vs alot better) - then a truly dismal picture for Labour emerges.
In the key areas - education, crime, economy, etc you will see that Gove, Davis, Osborne are way, way better than the pygmies Balls, Smith, Darling, etc.
On this basis the Tories will score more like 18 or 20 out of 22.
Brown's real problem is that the big jobs have the worst muppets in charge.
Can't see how anyone could give it a Labour majority in those battles, even being party political.
It'd be interesting to see how you score each though Iain.
Iain
This is a complete mismatch.
Having heard Brown twice today and just heard the FCO`s `Muppet`Minister Miliband, if he is the best they can up with as replacement for Brown then even a Russian millionaire cannot save them
I'd say Straw on the Labour side; all the rest tory.
Iain, you have the advantage of being more informed about the Conservative team than the general public and, indeed, Welsh political bloggers! Having said that the more familiar faces on Cameron's team do outshine their opposites, especially Osborne and (naturally) Hague.
I too tried to be objective and came up with 23 Labourites.
Fox might have had the edge if he wasn't such a nasty piece of work. Gove too. Pickles surely cannot be allowed to beat your chipmunk and is Cameron's Prescott figure.
Quite a few of the Tories are pretty much a case of who the hell are you??
Miliband clearly beats Hague who is a dilletante but the most impressive bar none of the 23 Tories barring this crippling lack of commitment.
Grocer Brown obviously stuffs flim flam man Cam.
I like Grayling OK ... NOT a drama queen which is refreshing ... but Purnell is ascendant.
PS I am amazed that anyone things the liar and incompetent Osborne outscores anyone. He's pathetic and crass with weasel words merrily tripping off his forked tongue like shit off a shovel.
Chris Paul - I used to think you were just harmlessly delusional. Now, looking at what you have just said, I'm convinced you're borderline retarded.
And yes, I mean for you to take offence at that.
I got 12 Conservative, 4 Labour, and 7 equal. And that was being generous and assuming that if I wasn't too familiar with a Tory and the Labour frontbencher seemed okay then giving it to Labour.
I suspect that even the Lib Dems would comfortably beat the Labour cabinet in a head to head comparison.
A pox on all of the shite , we need another Nov 5 during PMQ's and start fresh ...
Tankus
Iain,
When you consider the Liberal Democrat front bench against the Labour party it makes matters far far worse.
I mean we really do have a government of no talents!
Perhaps old battles should be forgotten and the Tories and the Liberal democrats should UNITE and form an alliance for better governance.
Just think of a shadow cabinet of that calibre then!
Where is the extremely dirty and naughty in a Dominatrix sort of way Caroline Flint, along with her arch nemesis that lovely chap Grant Shapps?
Strapworld,
As an economically liberal Lib Dem, I agree with many Tories. Perhaps if Cameron formed a minority government, we could work together on a case by case basis. I know there are Conservative bloggers who feel the same way.
But not a coalition or a merger. There must be a party whose rationale is liberalism. And you're going to have to go green in this hypothetical government. Like Germany, they know what it's all about.
Though I must say I've started my bank holiday celebration drinking, and I might regret this post tomorrow morning.
PS-
I admire Davis and Duncan for their libertarianism. And I hold a hatred for Hutton and Flint, so I suppose their opponets must be better than them.
Iain,
Disagree slightly
By my count it is 15 Con 4 Lab 4 Drawn (similar to the council elections really.
Not only do the Conservatives have a vastly superior front bench but the Libdems (without Clegg) also have a better frontbench than Labour.
Brown has created himself a leadership with only the dregs of the Labour Party left. All the big labour guns have pretty much jumped ship. That said I am now doubly glad to have seen them gone.
Chris Paul:
You are as deluded as your leader and they have yet to find the planet that he is on!
The problem with this is how you rate those in the job against those not. Mnay of the 'shadows' simply aren't doing anything so cannot be judged fairly, equally I have seen a number of Ministers look stupid trying to defend Brown, abolishing the 10p tax band, saying we are getting on with the job, saying he's listening, but is this a fair way to say they are anything more than careerists in the same way as those Conservatives who repeat cameron's phrases - thats the nature of political PR. So top five I think are 4-1 to Conservatives but rest are either untested or unknowns in term of are they doign a good job as minister or scrutineer.
Surely browns problem is that he squashed the opposition so that there would be no contest so now he's shown up as a hopeless twat there's no realistic alternative so I'm afraid it's intothe valley of death for nu-lab at the next general.
My theory is that Brown has *had* to build a weak cabinet.
Firstly he had already fallen out with many of the strong contencers whilst he was Chancellor, and secondly he chose a set of weak sycophants to bolster his own shaky image.
Mog said...
"the extremely dirty and naughty in a Dominatrix sort of way Caroline Flint"
Any details? Pictures?
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