Sunday 2 December 2007

Will capping union donations cause a civil war within the Labour party?

Gordon Brown must decide whether he is going to stay in the donorgate frying pan or jump into the trade union capping fire. Either way he's in for a torrid time of it. If he doesn't agree to union capping, then he will have reneged on his comments made in the last few days of this fiasco. If he does agree to cap union donations then he is facing a potential civil war within the party.

This post (and comments) over on Labourhome gives us a good indication of just how deep into the mire Gordon could be taking his party. If there is a division of opinion on the Labourhome blog, then this will surely translate to the rest of the party. There is talk of Gordon and Hoon being on the wrong side of the fight to keep union money, and strong hints of looking for an alternative leader. Gordon may have leapt into serious trouble in an attempt to rid himself of his current predicament. A tactical error which could see the Labour party destroy itself in an internal war.

This all could have been avoided if Gordon had done the right thing - not the spin thing. Instead of blaming the donation system (which his party masterminded), he should have blamed those who broke the rules of that system. He should have sacked everyone involved in this whole affair. Then he should have announced that if he caught anyone else "at it" they would also be sacked and reported to Knacker of the Yard.

Now Brown is stuck with the choice of either going back on his word (of agreeing to a cap), or alienating masses of Labour and trade union members. Gordon keeps talking about making the hard choices, but many will find this one impossibly hard to swallow.

6 comments:

Anonymous said...

Brown is trying to deflect attention from his own party's failings - so blaming the funding system is probably worth pursuing as far as he's concerned.

Daily Referendum said...

LFAT,

Yes he's trying to spin his way out of this, but in his hurry to extricate himself he could well have dropped himself right in it.

Anonymous said...

Yeah, Labour unions are gonna crucify him over this, this may just finish him off. Dropped himself in it is right, the Unions will be having none of it.

Daily Referendum said...

Let's hope so, many labour members are not at all happy.

Anonymous said...

Its one thing selling out the country but when he sells out his own party, the labour hitmen will come calling.

Personally, if they do remove Brown or if he resigns, the public and media better bloody force a general election.

Daily Referendum said...

I should hope so, otherwise we will have had two PMs that we have not voted for.