Labour to play leadership card at the next election
Labour is to make leadership a defining issue at the next general election, according to a party whip.
In interviews with broadsheet newspapers, Fraser Kemp, a deputy election co-ordinator, said voters would be asked to compare the personalities of Tony Blair and main opposition leader Michael Howard at the next election, expected in May this year.
Mr Kemp – deputy to election strategist Alan Milburn – told The Financial Times: “As you get nearer the election, people’s minds focus away from the question of a referendum on a Labour government to what British elections are under our system, a very stark and straightforward choice.
“And that straightforward choice is who runs Britain, who leads Britain is it Tony Blair or Michael Howard?”
The Labour MP for Houghton and Washington East said the campaign would focus less on the controversies of the Westminster village and more on communication and open discussion with voters.
Labour is expected to kick into gear its election this month, with a series of poster campaigns emphasising the strength of the British economy under Mr Blair and how mortgages would inexorably rise under the Tories.
The election campaign is to be fought under the slogan “Britain is working. Don’t let the Tories wreck it”.
Election strategists have pinpointed Mr Blair’s global standing as a key ticket to winning the next election.
Mr Kemp said Labour, aiming for an historic, unprecedented third term of office, would foreground Mr Howard’s role as a former Tory home secretary.
“Michael Howard will be held accountable for his record in government and there is no way of escaping that. He is that direct link with the Tory party of the past,” he said.
Mr Milburn said the next election would signify a “watershed” and the “last stand of the Thatcherites”.
Labour currently leads the Tories by several points in opinion polls, having weathered the fallout from the unpopular war in Iraq and the independent probe into the intelligence on Saddam Hussein’s weapons of mass destruction by Lord Butler.
Mr Blair has already announced he will stay for a third administration, but will bow out at a fourth.
In a separate interview with The Telegraph, Mr Kemp said he had heard reports Mr Howard “suffered a wobble” in November, after questioning his effectiveness as party leader.
“He asked a lot of soul-searching questions, particularly at the time in November when he found he was doing worse than Iain Duncan Smith in the polls,” Mr Kemp said.
The report was quickly dismissed by Conservative party central office.
Liam Fox, co-chairman of the party, said Mr Kemp’s comments were made to draw attention away from former Home Secretary’s David Blunkett resignation.
“This is Fraser Kemp’s fantasy. Michael has always stuck to his strategic plan,” he said.
“Labour will find that between Michael Howard and Tony Blair, it is the public distrust of Tony Blair that will be Labour’s Achilles heel.
“This is wishful thinking from a Labour Party that has been rocked by the David Blunkett scandal and the collapse of trust in Tony Blair.”
In a Christmas message to Labour party members, Mr Blair said Labour would be highlighting the economic record of life under Margaret Thatcher and John Major.
The premier said members had a “duty” to flag up Mr Howard’s apparent advocacy of mass unemployment, high interest rates and record repossessions, adding “it won’t be a campaign the Tories will enjoy”.
He also underscored the Tories’ hostility to the minimum wage.
“Remember when Michael Howard and the Tories went around the country saying the minimum wage would destroy jobs? Of course, it didn’t.
“Labour has shown it is possible to both create jobs and tackle poverty pay.
“I know it sometimes doesn’t feel like it but people are now better off than they were under the Tories.”
