James Forsyth

Nearly everyone in Westminster says the same thing when you ask them if there will be an election early in 2009: Brown should call one but he won’t. The thinking goes that the worst probable result for Labour early next year is a narrow Tory majority and the best one is Labour as the largest party in the Commons. By contrast in 2010, Labour could get absolutely shell-shacked. The new YouGov poll today has Labour no longer rising in the polls, it is steady on 35 while the Tories are up one to 42—Jonathan Isaby thinks that this trend is enough to see off the prospect of an early election. But there is reason to believe that these numbers will get substantially better for the Tories over the next 12 months.

This story seems almost too good to be true: Peter Mandelson is, apparently, going to make a guest appearance on Strictly Come Dancing tomorrow night. The Belfast Telegraph reports that: “The Secretary of State for Business is expected to take to the dancefloor alongside celebrities Lisa Snowdon, Rachel Stevens and Tom Chambers to wow the crowd in a Christmas extravaganza.” The plus side for Mandelson in going on is that it will do much to soften his image and help elevate him above the political fray. The risk is that he’ll be seen to be tangoing while the economy crashes. Who’d have thought at the beginning of the year that at the end of it we’d be speculating about Lord Mandelson appearing on Strictly Come Dancing?

One of the political winners of the last quarter of this year has been Ed Miliband. He gave one of the best speeches of the conference season and then was promoted in Brown’s reshuffle to one of the sexiest portfolios in government. James Macintyre in his predictions for 2009 says: “Ed Miliband will emerge as the up-and-coming politician of 2009 and come to be regarded as Brown's natural successor.” One of the smartest commentators on the centre-left said something similar to me the other day citing Ed’s popularity across the party and the fact that the political energy is now on the more statist left where Ed has always been. His brother David, pretty anonymous since the banana incident, is rapidly becoming the other Miliband.

In 2004, George Osborne wrote a piece for The Spectator setting out ‘The 13 keys to Number 10’. It was adapted from one of those American guides that predict who will win presidential elections. In 2004, Osborne predicted Tory victory using it but that was more due to some scoring decisions that were based more on loyalty than reality. Indeed, going through it in a more sober fashion would have given you the correct result. Anyway, here are the 13 keys and my thoughts on who has the edge on each: 1. Real per capita economic growth during the parliament equals or exceeds the mean growth during the previous two parliaments. No. 2. The economy is not in recession during the election campaign.

The latest ICM poll for the Guardian has the Tories dropping below forty percent. The party is down seven points on last month at 38 percent but it is still five points ahead of Labour.  The Lib Dems are on 19. It seems that it is doubts about their economic competence which is pulling the Tories down: Brown has an 11 point lead over Cameron on the question of who is most likely to get the economy back on track. He also has the edge on who is most likely to make the right decisions in tough circumstances and, in a reversal from two years ago, Brown is rated as the more honest leader. However, Cameron still has the advantage on who has the most potential as Prime Minister suggesting that Tory fortunes might recover once the crisis eases.

Iain Dale has heard from a friend of his in the ad trade that Labour is buying up advertising space for January. This is going to take the rumours about an early election to the next level following on from The News of the World story that never was about election planning meetings in Downing Street and Trevor Kavanagh’s speculation this morning about a February poll. The argument for Brown going early is that he needs to go during the crisis stage of the recession and before it is evident whether or not the measures he has taken have worked. But the danger for him is that by once again flirting with an early election he reminds the public why they so lost faith in him last autumn. To deter Brown, the Tories need to start talking about this at every opportunity.

If anyone doubts the crazy excesses of the quango culture read the Mail on Sunday’s report on Ken Boston, who has finally resigned as head of the Qualifications and Curriculum Authority over the SATS marking debacle. Boston was paid more than seven times what his predecessor was. What on earth was the justification for this kind of salary jump? It beggars belief that the market rate for the head of a curriculum and exams body had jumped by that amount in five years. The people who agreed to this deal clearly had scant regard to taxpayer value. The Mail reports that Boston is not alone in receiving a vastly better deal: more than 80 other quango heads have received large pay rises under Labour.