Letter in Evening Standard  25 Sept 2007

Roy Hattersley is right to warn Gordon Brown against calling a snap election. No modern government with a secure majority has ever called an election so early in any Parliament or with so little pretext. Gordon Brown will be hard put to explain to the British people why they are being made to vote unnecessarily, and with hours of daylight shortening, voter apathy could well climb towards 50 per cent.

Brown could win another majority simply for not being David Cameron - or Tony Blair. But voters afterwards would see him as an opportunist who stole power from them when the going was good, and if he subsequently lost his reputation for economic competence they would turn on him even more savagely than they did with John Major.

If Gordon Brown wants to prove himself and great and distinctive Prime Minister he will govern until at least May 2009 - and introduce fixed-term parliaments.