Resigns

Just as the Conservatives and Liberal Democrats looked as though they were edging towards a deal, Gordon Brown appeared outside his bunker and announced his intention to quit as the leader of the Labour Party in order that a "progressive alliance" could be formed.

By doing so he has done England a huge favour.

A Labour-LibDem coalition that relied upon support from the SDLP, SNP, Plaid Cymru and the Greens would be the best possible government for England. Such a government would rely on the votes of 58 Scottish Labour, Lib Dem and SNP MPs, 3 Northern Irish SDLP MPs and 32 Welsh Labour, Lib Dem and Plaid Cymru MPs to legislate for England against the wishes of an English Conservative majority. The price of Scottish, Welsh and Northern Irish support would be their protection from the budget cuts that England will endure.

It is a recipe for constitutional crisis. It would propel The English Question into the mainstream of British politics and drive millions into supporting an English parliament.

I hardly think that such a progressive alliance is likely and I stand by my earlier prediction that the Lib Dems will do a deal with the Tories. In constitutional terms a Labour-Lib Dem progressive/rainbow alliance would be against the UK national interest because it would undermine the Union, and in political pragmatic terms it would be an extremely weak government that could not possibly claim legitimacy as the government of England. It would be madness. But politicians have been known to do mad things in the pursuit of power, and in order to keep the Tories out the Labour Party will do anything, and many rank and file Lib Dems will agree with them.

As an aside, by opening up the prospect of a Labour-LibDem coalition Gordon Brown has strengthened the Lib Dem's hand, enabling Nick Clegg to effectively name his price in his talks with the Conservatives and seal the deal. Gordon Brown is not a stupid man, he probably knows that a Labour-Lib Dem coalition is unlikely and possibly unworkable, but by falling on his sword his intention may be to force the Tories to acede to Lib Dem demands thereby helping the Lib Dems neuter and divide the coming Tory administration. And if that is his intention, then he has played his hand very well indeed because the conservatives in the Conservative Party will not like this one little bit.