Gordon Brown is down – but can he recover?

Gutless Gordon. The Brown Bottler. The Clunking Fist has become the Clucking Chicken. Just a few of the insults being hurled at Gordon Brown after his "cowardly, inept and deceitful behaviour" over the date of the next general election, says Leo McKinstry in the Daily Express. Brown has pursued such an "ill-conceived strategy that he has managed to unite the opposition, plunge his own party into turmoil and alienate much of the media".

For Brown's supporters, the past fortnight has seen an "unwelcome reversal of expectations", said The Guardian's Jonathan Freedland. He was supposed to be the grandmaster of politics, yet by allowing his aides to talk up an election that he then ducked, he "checkmated himself". At the Labour conference he was adept at populist politicking, but found wanting in his strongest suit argument. Brown claims he didn't call an election because he needed more time to set out his vision. His cheerleaders say he is worried about the electoral register being out of date or turnout falling because of November darkness. Others protest that he has had to focus on a series of crises facing the country. This is the language of the "truly desperate", says McKinstry. The only reason he hasn't called an election is because he knows he would lose his majority.

Alistair Darling's Pre-Budget Report hasn't helped him, said Patrick Wintour and Larry Elliott in The Guardian. By raising the inheritance-tax threshold, closing loopholes for wealthy non-doms and switching green aviation taxes from passengers to flights (see below), "magpie" Darling "shamelessly burgled three populist planks" of the planned Conservative manifesto. This "brazen stealing of Tory clothes" drew gasps from Tory MPs, said Andrew Porter in The Daily Telegraph; his opposite number, George Osborne, claimed "with some justification" that Labour has surrendered the political agenda on the back of one speech his own last week.

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Darling's statement was that of a man who "knows his party's policy has been trumped by his opponents", and can think of "nothing remotely exciting or original to do in retaliation", said Simon Heffer, also in The Daily Telegraph. The Tories have scored a "sharp tactical victory" and they should capitalise on it by turning their attack on Labour's spending plans. Even a reduced rate of growth in spending on health and education is indefensible if the NHS and state education remain structurally designed to waste piles of money, which they are. "If the Tories seize the radical agenda now, the Government could soon be floundering."

Not so fast, said Freedland. "Brown may be down now, but he can surely recover." What is needed is less politics and more government. Brown's had ten years to work out his vision: let's see it. He might focus on inequality; he could spell out a radical programme to decentralise public services; he could champion liberty and scrap the "wasteful and unnecessary" ID card scheme. A year from now we shall be in the run-up to the 2009 election. "He has 12 months to think and act big, not play catch-up with the Conservative party. This was the Gordon Brown we waited for. Now we want to see him."

Pre-Budget Report at a glance

1. New rules will allow married couples and civil partners to combine their inheritance tax-free allowance of £300,000, so that they can hand on £600,000 (rising to £700,000 by 2010-2011) without having to pay 40% inheritance tax. The rules have been backdated indefinitely for widows and widowers.

2. As of next April, capital-gains tax taper relief, which can reduce capital-gains tax (CGT) bills to as little as 10%, is to be abolished and replaced with a new single 18% CGT rate. This will benefit small investors and second-home owners, but hit small business owners and a handful of private-equity bosses. The last two groups will now have to pay almost twice as much tax. The annual exempt amount (currently £9,200) remains in place.

3. There are proposals afoot to make wealthy non-domicile residents (see page 40 for an explanation) pay an annual flat tax of £30,000 after seven years to retain their non-dom' status. The rate will rise after ten years in the UK. l Airline flights rather than passengers will be hit with a green' tax in November 2009, which will bring in £500m a year or more.

4. The Pension Credit for older people with small personal pensions will rise by £5 a week from next April for a single person, and £7.65 for a couple, guaranteeing everyone over 60 at least £6,450 a year. An extra £200m will fund free bus travel.

5. The income tax personal allowances for under 65s and national insurance contribution thresholds and limits, except the upper earnings and profit limits, will be raised in line with the retail price index (the headline inflation rate) from April 2008.

6. The child element of the Child Tax Credit will rise by a further £25 per year above indexation from April 2008, and by a further £25 above indexation from April 2010.