Gordon Brown Speeches, 1997 – 2006
Edited by Wilf Stevenson
Bloomsbury Publishing, 480pp, £30.00
Only the most substantial of Labour’s politicians have published books of speeches, among them Herbert Morrison, Roy Jenkins, Tony Benn and Neil Kinnock. Gordon Brown joins this pantheon. This collection is far more wide-ranging than might conventionally be expected from a chancellor.
Although as a collection of past speeches it is not a direct ‘blueprint’ for a Brown premiership, if the aim is to crack Brown’s Da Vinci Code, then this is the Apprentice Pillar. Devolution from Whitehall, for which the young Gordon campaigned passionately in the 1970s, features prominently. It is clear from this volume that those who see Brown as a centraliser are wrong – local empowerment is likely to be at the heart of a Brown premiership.
Other aspects of the Brown of caricature are debunked. Here is the Brown who made protecting the environment an explicit part of Treasury performance targets, before David Cameron sought to huskify the Conservative party. Indeed, Brown recognises that the environmental challenge requires a somewhat more sophisticated approach than bolting a wind-turbine to the Notting-Hill granny-flat; that it is inextricably intertwined with global inequalities and consumption patterns. Brown is a man for whom mention of Big Brother brings literary as well as televisual allusions. Here is someone who can inspire JK Rowling without feeling the need to pretend they read nothing beyond Harry Potter. That, in a prime minister, is arguably a good thing.