Gordon Brown is down but not out. Comparisons with the long death of the Major Government are largely wrong. Mr Brown’s political position is more secure: an effective Commons majority of least 70, against 21 and falling, for John Major. And, despite lots of grumbling, Labour divisions now are nothing like as deep as those of the mid1990s Tories. Moreover, Major showed that even weakened PMs can survive a long time.

The Government, and in particular Mr Brown, are going through a prolonged storm. They do not know how long it will last or how damaging it will be. That makes perspective and detached judgment very hard. Superlatives easily slip off the tongue but, even during the Major era, there were periods of relief, however short-lived the remission proved to be. Mr Brown’s main difficulty at present is not just the individual rows – Northern Rock, the missing child benefit records or the proxy donors – but one following the other in rapid succession and their cumulative impact. They have created an impression of incompetence and drift.

Some Labour officials have played into the hands of those wanting to paint the party as being as sleazy as the Tories by breaking the laws on disclosure that the Government itself enacted in 2000. The bizarre donors’ affair is very serious because the police are involved, but it is unlike the outright corruption of the cash for questions affair in the 1990s and mudslinging over “sleaze” risks damaging all politicians.

Just as Sir John Major was innocent of earlier allegations, so Mr Brown now has to watch, with bemusement, the unfolding of charges of which he knew nothing. No wonder that Mr Brown is said by all who have talked to him to be angry, as well as frustrated, that no one is listening to the many policy ideas and initiatives he is eager to push. (By contrast, these rows have obscured discussion about the squeeze on the defence budget and Britain’s educational performance.) Mr Brown and Labour have obviously taken a bad hit. The party’s rating fell on average by five points last month to 32 per cent, roughly the level before Tony Blair left office in the summer. The Tories remained flat at 39 per cent, rising to about, or above, 40 per cent at the end of the month. The picture is muddied by the Liberal Democrat leadership election, which has boosted the party in the short term.

All this is good news for David Cameron after his midsummer setbacks but it is still mainly a big fall in confidence in Labour rather than a ringing endorsement for the Tories. For instance, two recent polls still put Mr Brown just ahead of Mr Cameron as the better Prime Minister.

Moreover, in the mid1990s, the Labour Opposition’s rating was much higher, in the mid-to-upper 40s, with the Tories below, often well below, 30 per cent from mid1993 onwards. Such figures have to be treated with care in view of changes in polling techniques but the contrast is clear. Of course, the Tories could move well above 40 per cent, but that has not happened yet. This autumn they have won, or, rather, Labour has lost, several battles but it is far too early to talk of a turning point in what will be a very long campaign.

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