There’s a real 1997 vibe in the air what with disgraced ex-ministers and war criminals welcomed back into the club with open arms. And here’s the venerable Austin Mitchell MP on Gordon Brown’s new economic offensive:

Gordon Brown’s speech at the Parliamentary Labour Party last night was powerful, effective and well received. He knows that’s right. And puts the blame where it lies: on the greedy, the speculators, the lack of effective control.

Now, it might have escaped Austin’s notice but his party have been in power for eleven bloody years. It’s not a new broom we’re talking about here; a new government sweeping up the wreckage of the previous raddled and corrupt regime.

Gordon Brown’s blaming ‘the greedy, the speculators, the lack of effective control’, is he? So who’s been in charge for the last decade while the greedy and the speculators filled their boots? Who been quite content with with less than ‘effective’ control?

I’ll give you a clue: he’s an miserable, unkempt, out of his depth Scotsman with a funny mouth. This latterday conversion to the iniquities of greed has nothing to do with wanting to join the lynching in the hope he’ll avoid being lynched himself, of course.

Gordon’s been more than happy for these bad puppies to crap on the rug these long years. Now he’s going to rub their noses in it? We had Peter Mandelson fondling the rich at the birth of the New Labour government and John Hutton stroking them at its death. Brown’s got a brass neck, frankly, the horrible old hypocrite.