The Independent on Sunday's Jane Merrick has an exclusive, alleging that Gordon Brown's top aide, Stephen Carter, is quitting Number Ten after losing turf wars over strategy. Number Ten has put out a denial, but Merrick is sticking to her guns and maintains the story is 100 per cent true and triple sourced.
More on this later...
UPDATE: Jane Merrick has blogged some more on this.
25 comments:
Some counter claims around that Carter has been sacked, others say demoted. No 10 have issued a speedy denial but it's all lies, Carter has resigned but they're trying to lure him back.
Broon will be sacking the Commons French polishers soon too.
"Dispatch Box vandal caught in the act and culprit is Prime Minister Gordon Brown
Officials are used to finding graffiti on the priceless fixtures and fittings in the House of Commons chamber. Teams of French polishers regularly repair damage caused by tourists.
But during a recent examination they noticed that the beautifully-carved government Dispatch Box was covered in strange black pen marks. At the next Prime Ministers Questions they stood watch, and caught the culprit in the act.
As Gordon Brown gesticulated wildly with his black marker pen, stabbing at the papers in front of him and missing to hit the wood beneath, the awful truth was clear. The PM was the vandal
The damage is such that the French polishers have been unable to remove many of the deep markings, which can be clearly seen all over the wood.
An MP close to Mr Brown said: “Gordon is known as Zorro for getting his sweeping black pen everywhere, but I’m sure he’ll take greater care around the nation’s artefacts now he has been warned.”.
The boxes were a gift from New Zealand after the rebuilding of the House of Commons following the Second World War. The are modelled on the dispatch boxes in the Australian parliament and are made from a strong, teak-like wood from the rare Puriri tree and were thought to be almost indestructible."
Make Brown pay for replacements!
auntie flo, liked the Telegraph journalist on sky who suggested that the graffiti might have said
"Gordon woz here - but not for very long".
The table the despatch boxes sit on has "Tony Blair is a c#!*" engraved in its underside. That is confirmable. Was that him too?
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-299792/Vandal-carves-insult-Blair.html
All his adviseors and spinners are doing him no good.
Either he is hiring at great expense to us, people that are not up to the job.
Or he is so useless that even good
advisors cannot make him look like a PM.
auntie flo
Don't be silly he's an MP he'll be claiming it on expenses if he's forced to pay for the damage
Its all part of Labours end game or rats leaving the sinking ship if you like. There will be more and more of this as people want to distance themselves from Browns Labour. Darling is a prime example this week end.
The media in general led by the BBC has just not understood how bad the situation is. The BBC appeared shocked by Darlings comments as they just want to support their party.
The succession of PR spinners moving through No 10 proves only one thing - you can't polish a poo.
It's already clear that Brown's 94th "relaunch" is holed beneath the waterline and sinking fast. One can't blame Carter if he's decided to take to a lifeboat before his own credibility as a PR professional finally hits the iceberg along with his boss. He's got his CV to think about.
Iain - if this is true, and we will know soon, and given that it is coming the day after the Chancellor's hyperbolic interview in the Guardian, and after Milliband's positioning strategy for the future leadership, it does seem that the game may well be about up for Gordon.
Interesting. I must admit I didn't think much of the guy. I mean, Brown's problem (well, one of them) is that he still hasn't actually explained what he's about or why he's PM.
Agree with him or not, you knew what Blair was trying to do. He spelt it out. I still don't know what Brown wants to do.
And it's not enough to say, "I want to give hard-working families a better deal." That's not a policy or even a policy direction, that is a meaningless soundbite with which no-one reasonable would disagree.
Please, Prime Minister, you have been in office now for well over a year, what is it that you want for Britain - and please do just say something like, "opportunity for all" or some other crap like that?
Anyone seen Jack Straw on Andrew Marr this morning, normally lucid, he stumbling over his words, muddled his arguments and generally looked extremely uncomfortable. Almost car crash tv.
Fact this is posted so swiftly suggest Jane M has been on desperately trying to get follow for a heavily-denied story.
Doesn't mean it's not true, but it's looking shakey.
My nark says Carter has not resigned..but if he has - I understand he's been keeping a diary!
I've commented over at the Speccie a few weeks ago that Brown's advisers, long ago having seen into the future, are now having a laugh.
Cut to Thursday, Downing Street, in the upstairs playroom:
Darling: "Oooh what are we going to do?"
Brown: "Urrr"
Carter: "I know chaps, Al briefs the Grauniad that the country is now worse off than Zim and that we all have to throw ourselves off a cliff, then GB says on Monday it's not as bad as that and everyone says, that old Brown, he knows what he's talking about!"
Brown: "Urrr"
And so it came to pass...
Carter, knowing he can't trump this one, buggers off to pastures new.
Anon 1.55am said:
"Gordon woz here - but not for very long".
Anon 4.48 am said:
"The table the despatch boxes sit on has "Tony Blair is a c#!*" engraved in its underside. That is confirmable. Was that him too?"
Hilarious. Anon 4.48am, this ought to be confirmed, finger prints/DNA used to establish and punish the criminal responsible.
Nulab are turning public sector staff into their very own stasi or secret police to spy on the minor - and political - 'misdemenours' of the rest of us which they believe they have the right to define.
Perhaps its time we began spying on nulab in return - until we sack them and bin all of their sinister and bureaucratic edicts eroding our privacy and freedom.
I think by being such a drama queen over your 'no swearing' policy, you have rather been 'hoist by your own petard' when your own standards of behaviour fall short, Iain.
Your reasoning of 'Don't Like It? See if I care..' just puts you into the same category as chavs and hoodies and shows up how little class, style and sophistication, not to mention a lack of manners and consideration, you really have.
But then you are a Tory, so I guess it comes with the territory...
Tripled sourced! That'll be Jane Merrick, her imagination and, er, that's it.
Where's the quote from Carter or No10? There isn't one, that's because when she rang Damian McBride, he denied it to her!!
Anonymous 11.41. Does my face look bovvered? My blog, my rules. Don't like them, don't read it.
Has Jack Straw had a face lift? See his Marr interview.
Dark eye bags large enough to hold his ego: gone and oddly smoothed.
Deep brow furrows in repose suddenly smoothed away - until he grimaces
Crow feet the size of a pterodactyl's around his eyes: gone
Moles and kidney spots near his eyes: gone.
Yet this smooth as a baby's bottom, 'honest Jack' as he painted himself, couldn't make eye contact with Emily Maitlis.
Straw's eyes toggled to and fro, up and down - to the creative hemisphere of the brain loved by those 'economical' with the truth? Little wonder, since he evaded her questions at every turn.
"Eye toggling has to do with the computational load of lying, not with shame or guilt". One or two seconds before the truth economist answers, his busy brain sends his eyes saccading back and forth, up and down in a series of rapid changes of focus as his brain changes gears to cope with the difficult job of reconciling prior economies.
Straw's gestures, oddly reminiscent of Broon's guillotine hands, were ego shutters and defensive walls between himself and Emily's questions.
And still he didn't answer her questions.
Straw used the anology of averting a plane crash with our current economic crisis during his Marr interview.
You need experienced people at the controls, like Brown and Darling, claimed Straw.
Bad analogy, Straw, it reveals how panic stricken you and nulab are and what a mess UK's in.
Pilots so over the hill and burnt out that they need new choppers, face lifts or chemical assistance, such as botox, in an attempt to reassure the public they can cope need replacing.
We need younger pilots like Cameron and Osborne with state of the art knowledge and a fresh approach.
Broon, Darling, Straw and nulab are so ossified in their old ideological ways and spin that they're unable to change course to avert economic disaster.
Stick with Broon and nulab and this plane's going to crash.
Auntie Flo, the daily referendum blog did a great spoof of the pilot analogy a little while ago
http://dailyreferendum.blogspot.com/2008/05/this-is-your-pilot-gordon-brown.html
auntie flo - Plane Crash! What a berk. It's the current crew who have flown us towards the mountain range with too little fuel and no compass. Sitting in 1st class is another crew with a new compass and a couple of jerry full of Avgas and a chart showing an airfield. Let them take over, now.
meanwhile, in the real world, world war three is about to begin.
Iain - Why no update on this??
There wasn't much else to say yesterday on it. It seems he is indeed quitting his current post but the speculation is that he will take on a more minor role. I suspect that is a preface to going completely.
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