Starmer, Mandelson & HMT: why Gordon Brown has never been more relevant
Coffee House Shots
The Spectator
4.4 • 2.2K Ratings
🗓️ 14 February 2026
⏱️ 17 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
James Macintyre joins James Heale to discuss his new biography of former Prime Minister Gordon Brown: Power With Purpose. While the book has been years in the making, little did James know that it would end up published at the same time that its themes and subjects could never be more relevant.
James tells our deputy political editor about the relationship between Brown and Blair, what the Labour leader makes of Keir Starmer’s problems today and his reflections – with hindsight – about bringing the now-disgraced Peter Mandelson back into government in 2008.
Produced by Patrick Gibbons.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Hello, welcome to the special Saturday edition of Coffee House Shots. |
| 0:07.1 | Of course, it's Valentine's Day today, so why not talk about the most famous love-hate relationship |
| 0:11.3 | from modern British politics? |
| 0:12.9 | I'm referring, of course, to the friendship-turned-turned-ridered between Gordon Brown and Tony Blair. |
| 0:18.0 | And to mark that, and of course reflect on the recent scandal of evolving Peter Mandelson, we've got James McIntyre here, who's got a new book out on Gordon Brown, |
| 0:25.4 | Power with Purpose, and it's an unauthorised count, a biography of Gordon Brown's life, but he has |
| 0:30.9 | had some cooperation. So James, welcome to the podcast. First question I want to say is, why this book |
| 0:36.6 | and why now? Yes, well, I think Gordon |
| 0:39.7 | Brown was due a reappraisal and a kind of reassessment. I think his reputation has evolved for the |
| 0:46.7 | better since he left office. Some polling, particularly within the Labour Party, suggests that he's |
| 0:52.0 | well respected and popular, including sort of compared |
| 0:56.1 | to other living former prime ministers. As for the timing this February with the whole Peter |
| 1:01.6 | Mandelson saga, that was, I confess, probably accidental. But why now, I think, you know, there have been many books about Gordon Brown, |
| 1:13.9 | a couple of biographies, couple of books relating to his place in New Labour, but I think it |
| 1:17.9 | was time for another look. And you've mentioned about the timing of the Mandelson, we should |
| 1:21.8 | probably start on that. You, I mean, it's very clear from the concluding pages of your book |
| 1:25.8 | that Brown would be disgusted with what Manelson, as alleged to have done and been accused of. Just talk me through the relationship and how it's evolved, because there's some quite bits in the book where you talk about, quite moving about how, you know, when Mandelson's mother dies in 2006, Brown calls him to talk about feelings, etc. How is the relationship evolved over 30, 40 years or so? |
| 1:44.5 | That's right. I mean, he rang Mandelson at the height of one of their feuds to express his |
| 1:50.0 | condonances and sympathy over the death of Peter Manderson's mother, which reflects the complicated |
| 1:55.5 | nature of their relationship. I mean, Gordon Brown said, I think, on the radio some days ago now, |
| 2:00.4 | that Mandelson had never been a friend to him. |
| 2:04.0 | Well, that's perhaps true in his eyes, |
... |
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