Peter Hoskin

The Robinsons, Peter and Iris, are already in it deep.  But this snippet from Martin Fletcher's column, highlighted by Iain Martin, raises the level of, erm, ordure: "In 2007-08 the pair received a total of £571,939 from [their political] posts. They also use their parliamentary allowances to employ their two sons, daughter and daughter-in-law as aides." The problem, of course, is what happens when greater public disillusionment meets with Northern Ireland's already quite fragile political process.  Seems like a pretty toxic combo to me.

Guess who's back.  Yes, James Purnell, the man who tried his best to topple Gordon Brown last year, has emerged from the relative obscurity of the backbenches and Think-Tank World to set out a new prospectus for the Labour party in today's Guardian.  David nodded towards it earlier, but it's worth looking at in a little more detail.  Why?  Well, because it's an indication of how things could go for the post-election Labour party. The first thing that strikes you is how Purnell tries to defuse the controversy of his resignation last year.  "What?" you might think, "resigning from Brown's government is controversial? Sane, more like."  And, yes, I see what you mean.

There's that prism I mentioned: Ed Miliband writes an article for the Observer, which ostensibly backs Gordon Brown in the first paragraph, and it's written up as the first, tentative step on his own leadership campaign.  Thing is, that's probably also true.  The clue is in how far he steps off his ministerial beat*, to deliver an overall prospectus for the Labour Party: "Let's start, as our manifesto will, with what the country needs in the coming five years. It can't be about business as usual. We need to rebuild our economy in a different way from the past, with more jobs in real engineering not just financial engineering.

Well, well, well - Darling's Times interview, which James reported earlier, sure is a significant moment, and one which more than deserves a place on the spending cut timeline which I put together last week.  In fact, let's see what it would look like alongside a few of the most recent entries: 9 December 2009: Pre-Budget Report 2009 forecasts Public Sector Net Borrowing of £176 billion, and Public Sector Net Debt of £986 billion, in 2010-11. 10 December 2009: Alistair Darling puts in a bizarre performance on the Today programme, claiming that the PBR implies that departmental budgets would remain “pretty much flat.” 10 December 2009: The IFS works out that the PBR implies departmental budget cuts of around 19 percent over three years.

Ok, I know Labour circulars will always fly the party flag – but the email that's just gone out in Gordon Brown's name has to win some sort of prize for sheer party political effrontery.  With the subject line "When we fight we win," here's how it begins: "If there’s one thing that our recent by-election successes and this week's coverage about the £34 billion credibility gap in the Tories’ spending plans shows us, it’s that when we fight, we win. I know that despite the icy conditions, so many of you are preparing to go out campaigning this weekend. That, for me, says it all about the spirit of our Labour Party – we never give in, we never give up, we fight for progress house by house, street by street, day by day.

After June's rebellion, it's thought that Brown made a promise to his Cabinet colleagues: "...that cabinet ministers such as Alistair Darling will not again find themselves briefed against. There was deep anger in cabinet when Darling found himself being referred to in the past tense by Brown earlier in the week." But in today's Guardian: "The Downing Street spin machine knew something bad was afoot on Tuesday, but did not know precisely what was coming. So like any good media management operation, they tried to flush out enemies by briefing that Tessa Jowell, the Cabinet Office minister, was set to quit." If I were Jowell - and if that's what went on - then it's the kind of thing I'd resign over.  But I'm not, and I suspect she won't.

The secret ballot story is still ongoing – so it's a little early to be drawing conclusions just yet.  But, for now, it's worth thinking about what H&H are hoping to achieve by all this.  If it's true that they haven't discussed their plans with Cabinet ministers, then why are they sticking their heads above the parapet?  It's not as though they're the most widely popular members of the Labour backbenches, who could manage to influence huge swathes of the PLP.  Without a mass of pre-existing support, they surely can't have much hope of getting the ballot they've called for. Which just throws up more questions.

Whether anything comes of it is a different matter altogether, but this insight from the Standard's Joe Murphy deserves pulling out: "A senior minister is said to be close to quitting in a move to destabilise Mr Brown, the Standard has been told. There is speculation among MPs that a big beast such as Chancellor Alistair Darling, Lord Mandelson or Justice Secretary Jack Straw might be willing to tell Mr Brown to go if the party falls into fresh turmoil." Paul Waugh and Channel 4's Gary Gibbon have more on the story, here and here.  As I pointed out at the weekend, it looks as though the rumblings about Brown's leadership are returning – and at the worst possible time for our PM.