Chill political winds leave Brown adrift

Gordon Brown likes to cite his handling of the bluetongue and foot-and-mouth disease outbreaks as evidence of his competence. But a summer of pestilence on the farm now seems a distant memory, as outbreaks of human incompetence crash down on his government.

Monday was supposed to be the start of Labour’s fightback after last week’s series of setbacks. Instead the prime minister’s big speech to business was blotted out by the resignation of his party’s general secretary, embroiled in a party funding scandal.

The public is not impressed. A ComRes opinion poll on Tuesday’s Independent gives the Conservatives a 13-point lead over Labour, with the Tories on 40 per cent, Labour on 27 and the Liberal Democrats on 18.

One would have to go back to a Mori poll in 1988 – when Margaret Thatcher was at the apex of her powers – to find such a big Conservative lead.

On those figures David Cameron could look forward to being prime minister after the next election, a remarkable turnaround for someone Mr Brown’s advisers believed was politically dead and buried only two months ago.

Mr Brown claims not to worry about polls, which he ascribes to short-term political trends. On a trip to Africa last weekend he repeated the mantra that he was a politician for the long term, charting a “path of stability in turbulent times”.

Instead it is his government that has been buffeted by political turbulence. Last week there was criticism of the government’s handling of Northern Rock, the loss of 25m child benefit records and a mutiny by former defence chiefs.

On Monday the Labour party lost its general secretary, Peter Watt, who said he was unaware that using “fronts” to disguise the origins of big party donations was against the rules.

In spite of the setbacks, Mr Brown himself appears remarkably cheerful. Journalists travelling with him to Africa last weekend expected to find him in introspective and defensive mode – instead he was approachable, chatty and upbeat.

John Major and Tony Blair came to avoid the press on such trips.

The prime minister insists the public will soon forget recent difficulties and come to appreciate his seriousness of purpose, vision for the modernisation of Britain and reliability in times of global economic uncertainty.

Making tough choices – such as building a third runway at Heathrow and possibly agreeing to the construction of nuclear power stations – might mark him out as a serious politician, but they are not a surefire route to redemption in the polls.

Labour MPs know they are in trouble. Privately they blame Mr Brown and his young advisers for detonating the party’s impressive poll lead in October by stoking up election speculation and then backing away.

Some say the government is becalmed and drifting. Comparisons with Mr Major’s rudderless government in the 1990s, battered by each passing political storm, are becoming more common.

George Osborne, shadow chancellor, claimed: “Everything Gordon Brown promised about his premiership – competence, honesty and change – has been blown away in the last few weeks.”

Mr Brown’s response to claims his government is on the slide is to laugh. But with opinion polls suggesting otherwise and an election getting closer, his backbenchers may soon stop seeing the funny side.