Rob Merrick: Days to disaster for Gordon Brown

Apr 23 2008 by Rob Merrick, Liverpool Daily Post

THE blazing Labour row over the scrapping of the 10p tax rate is a tale of Gordon Brown’s scheming to succeed Tony Blair coming back to haunt him.

There is no other explanation for the mystery of how a man who has spent his political career fighting poverty could now be toppled for punishing the low-paid.

Make no mistake, it is the Prime Minister’s survival that will be at stake when rebel Labour MPs – led by Birkenhead’s Frank Field – force a vote on the 10p rate abolition next Monday.

They can only vote against their government by defeating the entire Budget – a catastrophic blow, which would leave Mr Brown’s leadership hanging by a thread.

Even if the Prime Minister staggered on until election day, the fatal draining of his authority could be summed up in two words – John Major. So how did he get into this mess?

The truth is that the death of the 10p tax rate – announced last year, but implemented only this month – was necessary to give Mr Brown a Budget-day “rabbit”.

It was only by scrapping the 10p rate that the then-Chancellor could afford to cut the basic rate to 20p – and boast of the lowest income tax rate for 75 years.

And he was desperate to make that boast to convince nervous Labour backbenchers that he had the popular touch, as the clock ticked down to Mr Blair’s departure.

Back in March, 2007, the Prime Minister-in-waiting had been rocked by a slump in his poll ratings and been branded “Stalinist” by the Treasury’s former top civil servant. A Blairite challenge loomed.

The tax cut – although quickly condemned as a “con” – shored up Mr Brown’s Middle England credentials and helped ensure his smooth succession. Almost no one noticed the millions of losers. Twelve months on, those low-paid losers have protested to Labour MPs who have finally woken up to what Mr Brown did.

Now they all have just days to avert disaster.

Mr Brown could have scrapped the 10p rate by taking all those who paid it out of tax altogether. No doubt, in his heart, the anti-poverty crusader wanted to do just that.

But the head ruled the heart, in a political calculation of what was needed to reach No.10. Now the fixer has been found out.

MANY thought it was bad news for Mr Brown’s leadership to be described as “porridge” compared with Tony Blair’s “Champagne” – but not Wallasey MP Angela Eagle.

The Treasury Minister, batting bravely for her beleaguered boss, insisted: “You can live a very long and healthy life on porridge, unlike on Champagne.”