Sparse platform: Gordon Brown (left) with cabinet ministers Yvette Cooper and Alan Johnson at the London launch on Monday of his latest policy programme

Is Gordon Brown in denial? Sigmund Freud’s amateur heirs were busy at Westminster this week trying to get inside the mind of the UK prime minister as he made perhaps his last big attempt to convince voters (and some in his own party) that he deserves another term in 10 Downing Street.