• 
• 
• 
• 
• 

Reflections on the General Election campaign

Written by John Johnston
Thursday, 06 May 2010 00:00

And so it is. The weeks of pledges, sound bites, newspaper backing, heckling, debating and opinion polls are over. Today Britain goes to the polling stations and the latest polls, as rudimentary and unreasonable as they are, suggest it is going to be a hung parliament. Of course it wasn’t meant to be like this. It was supposed to be over long ago.

When Gordon Brown finally called the called the election Cameron was so far ahead that he merely had to be round on May 7th to get the keys to Number 10. It hasn’t turned out like that of course. Cameron is now in the political fight of his life, fending off not just Brown but now Lib Dem leader Nick Clegg for that all important majority; it was his to lose and my how he’s tried to.

As Mr. Cameron has constantly pointed out to us lay folk, this election is all about change, but not necessarily the change that he was talking about. Social media has changed the topics of conversation, whether it be Moray’s Labour candidate Stuart Maclennan being sacked over his tweets, the outrage and cynicism being directed at people such as Conservative candidate Philippa Stroud over their misdemeanours, or the mocking of campaign propaganda. If newspapers had to fear for their lives before now, this election will leave them with many a sleepless night as their influence and ability to set the agenda has dissipated into thin air.

For all of its bluster and fury though, social media has been outshone by the box in the corner of the room, though nowadays it’s less of a box in the corner and more of a wall with speakers in your front room. Yes I’m talking about those television debates. With a wink to the post-X factor TV audience, the elections have changed the political landscape in Britain.

While the papers bickered over the manifestos, the public talked about which of the leaders they preferred and while Cameron talked endlessly about change, it was Nick Clegg who embodied it during those debates. He wasn’t the man hampered by so many years of power. He wasn’t the guy trying to come across as normal but really part of an elite set that the Mirror showcased on its front page this morning. He was novel, something new, and he took the debates by storm because of it.

This hasn’t been Cameron’s only problem during the election however. The former PR man has struggled to make people warm to him. Business leaders have been sceptical about his plans to pull Britain out of the economic misery, education and police leaders have been vocal about his big society plans. He hasn’t had the media backing that is usually always secure for a Conservative leader. Even Rupert Murdoch hasn’t been impressed.

It’s too easy to give all the credit to Cameron’s woe to Cameron though. Nick Clegg’s performances in the debates have made the Liberal Democrats resonance, while Vince Cable has supported him with his tidy put-downs of the current government and the perceived princes to the throne. In the view of the good old politics they have outperformed too. Their manifesto was sober and realistic, actually having figures while the two main rivals tried in vain to out-Stalinise one another in political rhetoric.

The real story however is not Cameron’s recklessness with his opinion poll leads. The real story has been Gordon Brown. To watch him on his campaign trail has been like the best Shakespearean tragedy, comedy and love poem combined. What more could we have expected from a man whose role model is Prometheus? Like Prometheus, whose liver was devoured daily, only to grow back, Brown’s ability to provoke attack has been astonishing.

Whether it has been bigotgate, poor handwriting or a myriad of other personal failures Brown has been derided, chastised, scolded and dismissed time and time again only to come back for more. Whether you like or abhor the man, you have to respect his resilience. Brown’s moment however only came in the final week. On Sunday he found his fire. Behind the pulpit and with nothing to lose he summoned up the strength of his father, the minister, as he spoke to Citizens UK and did something that no politician has done this campaign. In a year blighted by expense scandals and a chasm forming between the public and the politicians, Brown made the breakthrough and connected to the people with a fierce determination.

For the first time we believed in what a politician was saying. This election will be remembered for many, many things but boredom most certainly will not be one of them.

These are the opinions of the author. Se7en is not in favour of one political party over another