Has Gordon Brown passed the Lord Mandelson test?

We have the last of our leader’s profiles on the programme tonight: Gordon Brown. You know a lot about him already, so rather than rake over his schooldays we test him against the qualities needed in a good Prime Minister.

Thanks here should go to Lord Mandelson, who provided the tests: “backbone, team-building and grasp of policy,” he told us, are what make good Prime Ministers.

Team-building clearly hasn’t been so hot. Alistair Darling, to name but one, didn’t seem to feel he was being terribly well treated by some people in No. 10. Charlie Whelan mocks the idea that he is part of some sort of inner cabal that gets consulted.

Backbone/decisiveness was clearly shown in the banking crisis. The lonely decision to go ahead alone on recapitalising the banks after the US have said they won’t join in was momentous. Lord Myners tells us about that and also suggests that Mr Brown maybe finds it a bit harder to be decisive when major events and the clock are not ticking so loudly.

On policy, a sense of strategy, Gordon Brown denies he’s obsessed with tactics over strategy. I asked Peter Mandelson if he thought Gordon Brown would be a different sort of PM, mellower, if he got a mandate in his own name. He said, like Tony Blair in later administrations, Gordon Brown would get better. “Vote Gordon Brown, he’ll get better at the job?” I offered. “Even better!” Peter Mandelson replies … and I swear if you freeze the image there’s the beginnings of a smile on his lips.

You can see the film here.