Pick a Prime Minister

[Jourdain11]

Since it seems to be the widely-held view that Boris Johnson hasn't done a great job of handling this crisis, which recent (last 30 years) former PM do you think would have done the best?

Margaret Thatcher
John Major
Tony Blair
Gordon Brown
David Cameron
Theresa May

Throw in the LOTOs for good measure:

Jeremy Corbyn
Ed Miliband
(David Cameron)
Michael Howard
Ian Duncan Smith
William Hague
(Tony Blair)
John Smith
Neil Kinnock

Throw in Ken Clarke for good measure, since he was almost LOTO twice and held two of the Great Offices of State.

I am genuinely curious as to what people think! My guess would be Blair or Thatcher. Not sure if I could cope with the gushy Blair speeches every day, personally, though.

The ones I think would be bad but not as bad as Boris are:

• Teresa May as she seemed unable to get political consensus with the opposition parties
• Michael Howard as he was caught lying by Paxman
• Ian Duncan Smith as the Tories asked him to resign because he was such a bad leader
• Jeremy Corbyn, as like IDS, MPs in his own party did not respect him

The best would be:

• Thatcher as long as she was in her first two terms as she paid attention to detail, was a scientist and didn't put up with crap.
• Blair as he was a great communicator (before we all found out he was a big liar) I remember him turning up to do random interviews on TV programs like This Morning.

Gordon Brown, John Smith, Theresa May - I think she learned a hard painful lesson after the Grenfell Tragedy and at least she's efficient. Dull and efficient.

Not Fucking Thatcher. Presume people saying Thatcher are too young to remember that she sacrificed whole communities for her ideology.

Can I add Barbara Castle as the other greatest Prime Minister we never had.

I think would have been interesting as arguabley the most centric we've had for decades.

Brown because of economics.

Major and Millband I do agree would have been best with people.

Thatcher would have buried Cummings in Durham! Not sure she'd have sorted a job retention scheme though.

Yes, forgot Clarke and how he's known for being best PM ever had for a long time. Not my time though to remember.

I guess this shows that despite the blistering shit show Boris is. I guess none would have been perfect!

Happy dinosaur Ian Hislop brilliant suggestion. He was hilarious on HIGNFY the other night.

Robin Cook, William Hague and Roy Jenkins on the nearly list too.

A few years ago I saw Tony Blair's "A new dawn has broken, has it not? And isn't it wonderful!" speech. And I've never quite got over it. That and "the people's princess". The idea of him and Alastair concocting nightly briefings (and you can bet your bottom dollar he would have been doing all of them) and him gushing on our screens each evening, it is a little too much for me.

Margaret Thatcher
David Steele (he was a Dr after all)
John Smith

or the person I voted for in the leadership election:

Jeremy Hunt

First vote for Hague!

Only IDS, Howard and Corbyn are now on nil points...

@bellinisurge

Not Fucking Thatcher. Presume people saying Thatcher are too young to remember that she sacrificed whole communities for her ideology.

No. Not too young at all. I loathed and detested her but I reckon she’d have done a decent job now.

Can’t we have Nick Clegg? He’d be my first choice.

Can’t we have Nick Clegg? He’d be my first choice.

LMAO, and the joke candidates begin.

Have to say I’d go for almost all of those picks (with the exception of Corbyn and prob IDS) over Boris. Most of them, for all their faults, were at least serious or could at least give the appearance of being serious. Boris Johnson might be charming and a good campaigner but you need to be able to shelve your ego and work hard when tens of thousands of people are dying. I’m just not convinced he cares.

@Alsohuman , the willingness to sacrifice whole communities and, arguably an entire generation, are not the kind of leader we need now.

Cameron or Starmer

Gordon Brown. The more shit that happens the more I find myself thinking Gordon Brown was right about that. He was committed to improving society and went about it in sensible ways. How we went from that to these current self-serving grifters in such a short time is really concerning.

Difficult.

Margaret Thatcher would get things done, but how?
John Major might do a passable job but can't be sure
Tony Blair he'd lie
Gordon Brown maybe
David Cameron not a hope in hell
Theresa May lockdown means lockdown until we want to go anywhere (see also Johnson, B. and Cummings, D)

Throw in the LOTOs for good measure:

Jeremy Corbyn unlikely
Ed Miliband no
Michael Howard maybe
Iain Duncan Smith no chance.
William Hague at least he knows how to get to Barnard Castle to check for errant civil servants
John Smith no
Neil Kinnock maybe

Surprised to see the love for Brown on this thread. I didn't think he'd be that popular on Mumsnet.

Gordon Brown, based on his handling of the financial crisis in 2009. He immediately had a plan and worked with the leaders of other countries to resolve the crisis. Had we re-elected him, things could have been very different.

Tony Blair would have had the leadership and charisma.
Both also had experience of handling big epidemics in the UK.

Margaret Thatcher would have had the leadership, but not the humanity to help those worse off.

Both David Cameron and John Major have shown themselves to be broken reeds in a crisis. David Cameron resigned immediately after the Brexit referendum and John Major disappeared in the middle of the Black Wednesday financial crisis - his chancellor claimed he hid in the toilets.

I've had a cigarette with Ken Clarke. Top man, very affable 👍

OhTheRoses it was David Owen that was the Dr, not David Steele.

Owen a potentially credible candidate though (as were all the Gang of Four) Steele is excluded for me for knowingly turning a blind eye to Cyril Smith.

Gordon Brown for sure, I miss him.
Ed Miliband could be good too.
Ken Clarke would be loads better than Boris for certain.

I've had a cigarette with Ken Clarke. Top man, very affable

Lol didn’t Cherie say something about having to strip back to plaster when the Blairs moved into no.11 because of all the nicotine stained wallpaper?

He would defo be a better pandemic leader though, despite all the fags.

Gah bold fail.