Did Brown bottle it?
Updated on 07 October 2007
David Cameron has accused the Prime Minister of treating the British people as fools, by ruling out a snap election this autumn..
Mr Brown defended his decision, saying it would have been very easy to call an election, but he wanted time to show his policies working in practice.
But the Conservative leader claimed Mr Brown hadn't been straight with people over his reasons. And even ministers have conceded the whole episode may have damaged him.
Gordon Brown's nickname changed today. Out went "the big clunking fist", in came "Brown the bottler". One suspects the Prime Minister would rather have stuck with the old one.
Gordon Brown's nickname changed today. Out went "the big clunking fist", in came "Brown the bottler".
Protestors outside Downing Street may have enjoyed themselves but David Cameron did not lower himself today to utter the cockney word "bottler".
With a Sunday Times poll giving his party a three-point lead, the Tory leader adopted a disappointed air as he criticised Gordon Brown's decision to back off from an early election.
Mr Brown is also facing criticism from his own MPs for failing to listen to the wiser, greyer heads at his cabinet table who were urging caution - rather than listening to his young advisors.
One backbencher calls them "the teenagers", and they're accused of talking up a snap election.
Education Secretary Ed Balls is being criticised for implying in an interview that it could be a "gamble" to hold off an election. International Development Secretary Douglas Alexander is criticised for reportedly saying an early elction would have "sealed the deal" - in other words, ended Cameron's leadership.
Also criticised was cabinet office minister Ed Miliband, although those close to him insist he always thought the decision was "finely balanced".
The British may not want their Prime Ministers to be presidential, but the Liberal Democrats think there's one aspect of that system the public would support - fixed terms.
Gordon Brown is now desperate to be seen to be getting on with running the country. Tomorrow he'll be telling Parliament about reducing the number of British troops in Iraq, and today he hinted that in the coming weeks he'll be looking at the issue of inheritance tax.
