Challenge to Brown? Not this side of the next election

Labour rebels are convinced that they have Gordon Brown on the run over his abolition of the 10p income tax rate for the lowest paid. It is proving to be one of the most damaging issues on the doorsteps for Labour MPs campaigning in the local elections for May 1.

Brown leaves for the US tomorrow to focus on the global economic crisis but he will return to a growing rebellion next week when the MPs return from the stump. One Labour MP trusted by the leadership as a sounding board for the backbench said: "We are fucking pissed off that he's grinding down the faces of the poor, doubling the 10p income tax on the lowest paid, while going soft on the non-doms (businessmen non-domiciled in Britain for tax) and there's a lot of anger about the closure of post offices."

Referring to Brown's address to his backbenchers a fortnight ago, the MP added: "His performance at the Parliamentary Labour Party was frankly pathetic."

As the Mole has reported here before, Brown is also facing a defeat on 42-day detention for suspected terrorists. Whether or not he climbs down on the tax issue - he told journalists returning from Bucharest last week that he has no intention of so doing - he probably will eventually have to climb down on the anti-terror Bill.

For the time-being, however, he is breathing defiance, and stubbornly sticking to what so many of his backbenchers believe are mistaken policies. If he refuses to back down over the abolition of the 10p band, then the only way out of the impasse might be some sort of deal to help the group that has been identified as the main victims of the abolition - low-paid singles and couples without children. Such a tactical retreat would buy him more time to weather the storm.

As for the weekend papers flying kites about Brown's position as party leader, in spite of the the panic spreading all the way up to the Cabinet I would not put any money on a leadership challenge this side of a general election.

Charles Clarke has angrily ruled himself out of a challenge against Brown and those close to Brown say the suggestion that Ed Balls is deliberately undermining his boss so that he can have a crack at the leadership is frankly a load of cojones.

Brown's allies have told me he is losing his temper with his aides, and Cabinet ministers have been jockeying for position. But there is no stomach for another change of leader. The Mole is prepared to put his velvety nose on the block on this one - there will NOT be a leadership challenge to Gordon Brown this side of the election.

THE MOLE: TAX REBELLION

FIRST POSTED APRIL 14, 2008