LABOUR MPS, including some who had been previously critical of British prime minister Gordon Brown, have rounded on two ex-ministers who tried to force an immediate leadership crisis.
The effort by former defence secretary Geoff Hoon and former health secretary Patricia Hewitt, who are both retiring from the House of Commons this year, has run out of steam.
Senior ministers, some of whom were slow to support Mr Brown on Wednesday, and then less than effusive in the language they used about him, were more voluble in their support yesterday.
Roundly rejecting charges that he had been tied to the plotters, justice secretary Jack Straw said the “extraordinary” action by Mr Hoon and Ms Hewitt had been “ill-judged and very ill-advised”.
Saying the challenge had “sunk”, Mr Straw claimed it will “have the effect of bringing people behind the leadership even more” – though this is a view shared by few privately in the Commons.
It has emerged that Mr Brown had a series of private meetings yesterday afternoon with Mr Straw, chancellor of the exchequer Alistair Darling and leader of the House of Commons Harriet Harman.
Last night, there were signals that Mr Brown promised his senior colleagues that he would run “a more inclusive cabinet” and reduce the influence of schools secretary Ed Balls, a noted Brown loyalist and one who has become abrasively influential in recent months. Mr Brown described the leadership challenge as “a storm in a tea-cup”.
Foreign secretary David Miliband, who only issued a lukewarm declaration of support for Mr Brown at 7pm yesterday, said he had spent the day “like other members of the government on the business of government”.
“We’ve got an election to fight, Gordon is leading us into it, we’re determined to win it under his leadership and I’m looking forward to getting stuck into it,” said Mr Miliband, who backed out of challenging Mr Brown in 2008.
Meanwhile, Mr Hoon and Ms Hewitt faced bitter attacks in e-mails sent to them by fellow Labour MPs, including some critical of Mr Brown in the past. One MP described the two as “spiteful, disloyal and treacherous”.
The list included MPs Tom Levitt and Martin Linton, who supported calls for Mr Brown’s removal in 2008 when they said there was a need for “a new narrative” within Labour.
London MP Stephen Pound said: “In my opinion the forming of a circular firing squad is never a good idea. You don’t just shoot yourself in the foot you wound the party – and, more importantly, those who depend on Labour.”
Lord Peter Mandelson yesterday insisted that Mr Brown was the right man to lead Labour into a “very vigorous, very effective election campaign”.