Gisela Stuart Attacks Brown

I think it is safe to say that Gisela Stuart will not be on Gordon Brown's Christmas card list, after the tirade she has apparently written in next week's HOUSE MAGAZINE, which will be distributed at the Labour conference. There's a write-up about it in today's BIRMINGHAM POST. She says...

Gisela Stuart (Lab Edgbaston) said Labour under Mr Brown had failed to come up with fresh ideas and had forgotten how to communicate with voters. She criticised Government policies on dealing with terrorism and the European Union, as well as Mr Brown’s decision to invite former CBI chief Digby Jones, who is not a member of the Labour Party, to become a Minister.

Ms Stuart also claimed that a “steady trickle” of Labour MPs was simply giving up and leaving politics for other careers.

...But Ms Stuart, who was a staunch supporter of Tony Blair and is not friendly with current Prime Minister, pointedly warned that the failure to hold a proper leadership election when Mr Brown took the helm last year had robbed the party of the chance to discuss new ideas. She said: “Not only was there no election, the mere suggestion of mounting a challenge was interpreted as a sign of disloyalty. So the deputy leadership campaign became the proxy playing ground for thrashing out ideas.”

When Mr Brown came to power, Labour MPs were humming “Things Can Only Get Better”, the theme song used for the party’s triumphant election campaign in 1997, she said. She added: “Today it’s more likely to mean ‘surely it can’t get much worse’.”

Ms Stuart said: “It became clear that not only had we failed to renew ourselves with fresh ideas – we also seemed to have lost the knack to tell a good story.” She went on to criticise the Prime Minister’s decision to bring in people such as Digby Jones, Lord Jones of Birmingham, who are not Labour members, in what is known as a Government of All The Talents or GOATS.

The MP said: “The performance of the Goats has been patchy . . . Lord Jones, who started by refusing to join the Labour Party and has now publicly stated that he intends to step down as a Minister before the next general election. But we can expect him to keep his life peerage - courtesy of a Labour government.”

“Bringing outsiders into the tent to be inclusive is one thing, but those brought in to divide the opposition have a tendency to be troublesome.”

I think it is safe to assume Ms Stuart has request a nomination paper.