Election

On today's 'The World This Weekend' on Radio 4, they interviewed a local Labour party chairman attending the Bournemouth conference about speculation about Brown calling an election. He said that the party ought to get the election out of the way, so that they could turn their attention to a badly needed internal party debate about policy and future direction. Brown's strategy is clear enough: use briefing to fuel speculation about an early election, but refuse to rule anything out. He is unlikely to string it along until Spring 2009, but if he can keep it up until the end of next Spring, he largely averts the threat of the most politically damaging outcome - a genuine debate within the party about policy. It can't happen while there is speculation about an election around the corner, and it can't happen in the months leading up to an election (ie from about next summer).
Which all goes to demonstrate (again) that elections in the New Labour era are nothing but functions of internal party conflicts, in which the despised public are invited to express their opinion on a meaningless question.