Smash hit

At the next stop, on the site of an old British Steel foundry, the Chancellor visited the Advanced Technology Centre, part of Stourbridge College. Shane Barrett, a first-time voter and apprentice carpenter, got the full Brown campaign treatment.

The Chancellor is a better campaigner than he once was. He has perfected a warm, if slightly routine, style with the voters: the men will always be asked what football team they support. The women will get encouragement for their careers.

Mr Barrett clearly likes the Chancellor, and when Mr Brown had moved on I asked him if he thought he would make a better prime minister than the current one.

“Wouldn’t be hard, would it,” he said, grumpily.

“What do you mean?” I asked.

“Blair’s a liar. I wouldn’t be voting Labour if it weren’t for Brown.” The other apprentices nodded their assent. One day, Mr Brown will surely look back on these as his salad days.

If nothing else, the 2005 election has remade the Chancellor as The Indispensable Gordon. No longer the sullen, brooding presence at the Prime Minister’s shoulder, constantly fingering the dagger in his pocket, but the loyal defender, ready to strike out at enemies.

His return from internal political exile at the start of the campaign, and with it Labour’s renewed emphasis on Britain’s strong economic performance, marked the clear turnaround in Labour fortunes.

This week, once again, it was Mr Brown who came to an embattled Prime Minister’s rescue. As Mr Blair fought his way through yet another blizzard of Iraq questions, it was Gordon who led the Cabinet search party and hauled him to safety. He told reporters and some bemused business folk who had come along to the Bloomberg headquarters expecting to hear about Labour’s business manifesto that he backed every aspect of the Prime Minister’s leadership in the Iraq war.

Earlier in the week, as we travelled up from London Euston station to the Midlands, Mr Brown was in effusive form.

Outside, relics of Britain’s industrial past flashed by and the Chancellor was eager to talk about his ideas for enhancing Britain’s competitiveness, but the conversation was repeatedly interrupted by admirers.

A starstruck passenger asked for not one, but two autographs; the only sort of inflation the Chancellor is ready to countenance. It turned out the passenger worked in the environmental department of a water company, and he thanked the Chancellor for the landfill tax.

Times Recommends

• Times Christmas appeal: Letter from the Editor
• Conferences — what a waste of money
• Schools supremo learns a painful lesson