Peter Mandelson was the man who betrayed Gordon Brown, now he is the one who
is saving his political life.
The Prince of Darkness has been Gordon’s only ray of light over the past few
months. The sinister minister has become the acceptable face of the
Government, smiling from every television screen, placating the plotters and
managing the ministers. Despite having to watch as the petals fall off new
Labour’s red rose, he has remained loyal to his old enemy.
Now the Prime Minister has rewarded him, making him First Secretary of State,
and Lord Mandelson is thrilled. Yesterday morning he was at Mr Brown’s side
masterminding the reshuffle. One friend says: “He has finally got the role
he always wanted, being the right-hand man to the Prime Minister, treated as
his equal. The only problem is that it is the wrong Prime Minister at the
wrong time.”
However calm he appears, the new deputy Prime Minister in all but name must
worry that his role may be shortlived.
“If you only watched the television and the mounting hyperbole you would think
the Government was in the grip of a political crisis,” Lord Mandelson says.
“But when you go through the black door, there is calm and a lot of good
sense. I can quite honestly say Gordon hasn’t lost his humour once, no
phones have been thrown . . . certainly nothing’s been hurled in my
direction.”
Hasn’t Gordon lost all authority because he couldn’t appoint the Chancellor
that he wanted? “I’m not going to talk about Ed Balls. What I’m interested
in is new Labour and its continued success.”
Lord Mandelson calls Tony Blair, Gordon Brown and himself “the two and a half
Musketeers, I am the half”. “We built up new Labour and we’re not going to
throw it away just because we have hit economic turbulence or we’re in a
political crisis. At times like this grown-ups have to keep their nerve.”
But James Purnell is right, surely, to leave the Cabinet if he believes that
Mr Brown is damaging the party’s chance of success at the polls? “I don’t
think to run away from the Cabinet is brave, and I don’t think it’s well
judged. I understand he wanted a different face at the top of the party but
new Labour is not about faces, it is about policies.”
He warns the plotters: “Another leader couldn’t simply mean another
coronation; you would have to have a leadership contest. A picture would be
presented to the country that is self-indulgent. And having got a third
leader in the course of a Parliament, having a general election shortly
afterwards would be unavoidable too.”
It is extraordinary that the man who once fought daily with Mr Brown when he
was Chancellor has become his lynchpin. “I have become a loyalist not
because I’m a sycophant — I’ve never been a sycophant towards Gordon. It’s
because of his personal qualities, his understanding of the big picture,
that I support him now.
“I am sorry that he sometimes appears a bit rough or idiosyncratic but I would
rather have someone with brains than someone who is showy but has no
substance.”
Does this mean that he has changed his mind since 1994, when he appeared to
choose Tony Blair over Mr Brown in the leadership race? “We were a
triangular friendship. At that time the hand of history was placed on Tony’s
shoulder, not Gordon’s. I didn’t place that hand, it was what people
wanted.”
Lord Mandelson says that he admires the Prime Minister’s ability to handle
“the big challenges in what is a very torrid environment”. Gordon Brown, he
says, “is a policy person, not a pop star. He does have emotional
intelligence; he also has real values, which drive his politics. He has
taken on the global recession and the collapse of public trust in politics
well.”
Now the two remaining Musketeers must, he says, finish what they created. It
is the new Labour ministers who have been resigning, though; they obviously
don’t trust Mr Brown to continue the project. “Blairite and Brownite is a
tag whose usefulness has gone. I know what Hazel [Blears] went through, it
was bitter and bloody. When she explained why she left the Government in the
way she did I understood, although I regretted it.”
And Jacqui Smith? “There comes a moment — and I remember this from my own
experience — when you feel that nobody is giving you any credit, nobody is
listening to your explanation. At that point you think ‘Is it worth it?’.”
Many newspapers have also lost faith in the Prime Minister. “Everyone now
talks of Tony Blair as if he had a permanent halo around his head, but I
can’t count the number of times he was laid out and kicked almost to death
by one newspaper or another.” Surely he has to respect what the voters are
saying about Mr Brown this week. “Given the basinful of publicity that we
have had I don’t expect a startlingly good result in these elections.”
The backbenchers are also fed up. How many signatories calling for Mr Brown to
stand down would they need to collect before the new First Secretary took
them seriously? “You could probably get between 60 and 70 backbenchers of
both parties to sign almost anything. It depends who they are. This exercise
is being manipulated by a handful of people.”
Will Gordon have to go if 100 sign up? “It would require somebody plausible to
stand against him. I don’t think James Purnell has leadership ambitions. I
had leadership ambitions for him but I don’t think he had them himself. I
think he’s written himself out and I regret that. The party will feel a
combination of disappointment and mystification at what he’s done.”
Surely Alan Johnson is a serious candidate. “You want me to speculate about
the leadership, to mark people out of ten. You will find that this is a
Cabinet not just of talent but of unity.”
Now that Lord Mandelson is the most senior member of the Cabinet after Mr
Brown, surely he can put leashes on the macho Reservoir Dogs who roam No 10
briefing against those who do not toe the line. “Gordon attracts men, women,
Scots, English, you can’t label them. The only thing that marks them out is
the very long hours that they patiently have to endure. I can’t keep up. I
like karaoke but I’m not a great football fan.”
Does he have to pretend to be laddish? “I don’t have to pretend anything at my
stage of life. I bring the sense of humour.” He calms down the Prime
Minister, he says, “by being pretty blunt in my opinions, by seeing the
funniness in situations and occasionally teasing him”.
But Mr Brown can be pretty brutal. “I’ve never met a perfect politician,
including the one who’s talking to you. I’ve come through my catharsis and
emerged a more relaxed, less spiky, less insular individual.”
Having worked with both Mr Blair and Mr Brown, Lord Mandelson believes that
the main difference between the two is the hours that they keep. “Tony’s
rhythm was up early in the morning, out with the fountain pen to write his
speeches. He would drive himself during the day, then disappear into the
warmth of his flat, his guitar and his children. Gordon is also up early but
it is hard to persuade him that his day’s work has ended.”
Isn’t this a polite way of saying that Mr Brown is obsessive? “If he gives the
impression that it’s positioning and politics he’s letting himself down
because his attention to detail is what characterises his approach. It’s an
amazing thing that somebody could offer such an image of themselves which
contradicts what he is really like.”
If he felt that Mr Brown was damaging the party would he tell him that he
should go? “My loyalty is to what the Labour Party stands for, and putting
that into practice by winning elections,” he replies. “I wouldn’t let
anything get in the way of that.”
Doesn’t he wish that he had been Deputy Prime Minister for Mr Blair, not Mr
Brown? “I had a difficult relationship with Tony. I was his best friend and
his chief ally, but that was the problem because it excited jealousies. Of
course, one of the sources of the difficulty was the tensions between the
then Prime Minister and the then Chancellor. All that’s gone. I’ve
reinvented myself.”
Now he is the one keeping Mr Brown in power. Some say that he is the
“roadblock to reform” — preventing the Labour Party from saving itself by
getting rid of its leader. But he says: “I was once seen as a divisive
character, now I’m seen as a unifier. Once upon a time I was the Prince of
Darkness now I’m the Prince of Stability. I much prefer the latter.”
Mr Blair reportedly once said that the new Labour mission would only be
complete when the party learnt to love Peter Mandelson. Now they respect
him. Surely he is an obvious contender for the leadership. “In this
democratic age leading the country from the House of Lords would be a bit
much.”
Instead he has become the elder — “a bit less of the old” — statesman.
“Sometimes I do feel I’m standing a bit apart. I’m an outsider but at the
same time I feel very much in the swing of it. I enjoy being in the Cabinet
now more than I did before.
“Last time they saw me as a meddler, as an interferer, but now everyone
realises I have no more ambition. I’m content to serve in what I’m doing now
and I’m in a more harmonious phase of my life. I’m not the King, nor am I
the kingmaker.”
So is he now Mr Brown’s Willie Whitelaw? “I suspect that’s what people will
say.”
A peer’s progress
Born October 21, 1953
Educated Hendon County Grammar School and St Catherine’s College,
Oxford
Career Peter Mandelson worked as a producer for London Weekend
Television before being appointed the Labour Party’s director of
communications in 1985, when Neil Kinnock was leader.
In 1992 Mr Mandelson became MP for Hartlepool.
When Labour came to power in 1997 he was made Minister without Portfolio in
the Cabinet Office — with responsibility for the Millennium Dome.
He joined the Cabinet in 1998 as Trade and Industry Secretary, and resigned in
December when it was disclosed that he had taken a loan from Geoffrey
Robinson — at the time Paymaster-General.
Mr Mandelson returned to Government in October 1999 as Northern Ireland
Secretary, resigning again in 2001 after a row about the Hinduja brothers’
passport applications.
In 2004 he became a European Commissioner, with the trade portfolio.
Last October he again returned the Cabinet — as Lord Mandelson, the Business
Secretary.
Family His grandfather was Herbert Morrison, who was deputy to Clement
Attlee in the postwar Labour Government
