Brown - it looks bad

Anthony Barnett (London, OK): “In the modern world” we “have to be able to draw on something wider than just Westminster if we are going to govern effectively", Gordon Brown told BBC broadcasters in an interview to be shown on Newsnight tonight, currently being broadcast on BBC news 24 (available here in full after transmission). He goes on, "I have learned that 'pulling the lever solutions' are not always the ones that are going to work best." Instead you have to “involve people and build a national consensus, if you are going to solve the challenges of the future." Really! To say with all humility that you have learnt that you need to persuade people to agree with you in order to get things done is hardly a lesson in democracy, it smacks of the 'humility of monarchs' down the ages. It is said that Brown will surprise us when he takes over next week and promises "constitutional measures". But then he speaks of "being sensitive" to the feelings of the English. The lessons of 'pulling levers' is that the problem is with the overall nature of the way we are governed. Being sensitive to English is unlikely to persuade them to support pulling this or that lever. They are more likely to demand return to Runnymead.