Bruce Anderson: Part minister, part hostage, Mandy changes the game

No one ever thought of Gordon Brown as a master of surprises, but this is one for the record book. It was as if, early in Book One of Paradise Lost, God had invited Lucifer to rejoin the Angelic cabinet. But apart from the shock, and the comedy, we should acknowledge that this is a good appointment. In a Cabinet full of mediocrities, some of them in great offices of state, Peter Mandelson will be a thoroughly competent, grown-up minister.

He has had a long apprenticeship. Not long after the 1997 election, a Labour minister in the Lords arrived at the Tory Whips' office. Because his civil servants had fed him duff information, he had given a misleading answer in the House. What should he do? "Don't worry," came the reply: "It's happened to us all. Just stand up tomorrow, apologise and correct the record. No one'll give you a hard time." The minister left, relieved. An hour later, he was back, crestfallen. "What's plan B?" "What d'you mean?" "Apparently Mandelson has decreed that we are never to apologise to the Tories ever, for anything."

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Pride cometh before a fall. Mr Mandelson was lucky to recover from his first resignation, forced upon him because he made a misleading statement when applying for a mortgage. If a Tory had done that, there would have been no second chance. As it happens, a mere peccadillo had been committed. That sub-prime mortgage did not turn toxic, and Peter Mandelson did turn into a good Northern Ireland Secretary.

Then came the Hindujahs, and the allegation that Mr Mandelson had exercised improper influence on their behalf. As rapidly became clear, he had done nothing wrong. But there were two problems. His initial response to the queries was both high-handed and unconvincing. That is the trouble with Peter. Even when he is telling the truth, he can often sound as if he has something to conceal.

This helps to explain the second problem. He had forfeited No 10's confidence. To his enduring dismay, Tony Blair and Alastair Campbell were not willing to defend him. So he found himself drafting a second resignation. At that stage, everyone – including Mr Mandelson – thought that it was the end of his ministerial career. Everyone was wrong, and there will be one immediate benefit. The Mandelson appointment will be good for morale in the higher reaches of commerce and business. Company directors will be aware that there are voices in the Labour Party, urged on by that great economic sophisticate Polly Toynbee, who would like Gordon Brown to govern with his bile duct. Eighteen months of scorched-earth socialism would show the middle classes how a Labour government ought to behave.

Businessmen knew that Tony Blair would never listen to that sort of nonsense, but Gordon Brown? Harder to be sure – until Peter Mandelson's arrival. This was the man who said that New Labour was relaxed about people becoming filthy rich (there might have been the hint of a sub-text: "As long as they pay for their peerages"). So the rich can now relax, whatever their wealth's state of hygiene.

That was not the sole reason for the recall. This is an intensely political Prime Minister. He does not want to govern against the constant background noise of Blairite plotting. By hiring the most prominent Blairite of them all, part minister, part hostage, Mr Brown hopes to restore calm. This may be harder than he realises. A lot of Labour MPs are discontented, not because they are uber-Blairites (whatever that means) but because they think that the Government is sleepwalking to defeat. There are also those – the "rich are filthy" tendency – who regard Mr Mandelson as the incarnation of everything which they most detested about Blairism. It must also be recognised that a lot of voters do not take Mr Mandelson as seriously as he takes himself.

Even so, Mandy's presence at the Cabinet table makes it more likely that Gordon Brown will be able to hang on until 2010. Whatever his ministerial title, Peter Mandelson will also act as minister for spin. This will not be universally unpopular. That said, there will be a number of Labour supporters who hope that Mandy can work some of his old magic.

Magic, it was. Earlier and clearer than anyone else, Peter Mandelson saw what needed to happen if the Labour Party was ever to return to office. It helped that by 1985, when he went to work for Neil Kinnock, Mr Mandelson no longer had any encumbering baggage of belief or principle. As a student, he had flirted with the Young Communist League. Much later, he almost joined the SDP, but then had a better idea. Why not turn the Labour Party into the SDP? In the early Eighties, Peter and I were colleagues at London Weekend Television. When Mr Kinnock recruited him, I had a phone call from Norman Tebbit, then the chairman of the Tory party. "We don't have to worry about this Mandelson fellow, do we?" In a prediction which is not embarrassing to recall, I replied: "Oh yes we do."

It took a few years, plus considerable help from the lunatic wing of the Tory party, before those anxieties were justified. But Peter deserves great credit for his fixity of purpose. Whatever the vicissitudes, his eyes were firmly focused on power. "PO-WER". It was instructive to hear him roll those two syllables around his mouth. No oenophile ever caressed his palette more lovingly with the finest vintages.

Yet it would be wrong to accuse him of cold-hearted single-mindedness. Until 1992, Peter shared the widespread assumption that Gordon Brown was the predestined future leader of the Labour Party, with Tony Blair in a younger brother role. In the long-fullness, Mr Brown would take over from John Smith.

There were some dissenters. After the 1992 election, the journalist John Lloyd and the television executive Barry Cox tried to persuade their old friend Tony Blair to challenge John Smith for the leadership. Mr Blair refused to take their advice, and he was wise to do so. It would have been too early.

But there is no reason to think that Mr Mandelson agreed with Messrs Cox and Lloyd. At one stage, he advised another LWT alumnus, Michael Wills, now a Labour minister, to write speeches for Gordon Brown and help him to become leader of the Labour Party. Mr Mandelson did not change his mind because he is a compulsive back-stabber. He switched allegiance because he concluded, after much agonising, that Tony Blair was the better politician. Gordon Brown apart, who now questions that assessment?

Mandy was there at the beginning. The New Labour project depended on a handful of men: Tony Blair, Gordon Brown, Alastair Campbell, Philip Gould – and Peter Mandelson. Mr Blair was the most important. Thereafter, we could argue about precedence. but Mr Mandelson was indispensable. It is fitting, therefore, that having been present at the creation, he should return in time for the obsequies. Sic transit gloria Mandy.

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