Gordon Brown Calls Voter ‘Bigoted’ - The Lede...

Last Updated | 12:25 p.m Apparently unaware that his microphone was still on as his motorcade sped away from a stop on the campaign trail on Wednesday, Prime Minister Gordon Brown was overheard telling an aide that a woman he had just sparred with on the campaign trail was “bigoted.” Mr. Brown’s remarks, made in Rochdale, England, about a woman named Gillian Duffy who complained to him about immigrants from Eastern Europe, can be heard near the end of video posted on the Web site of Britain’s Channel 4 News.

On the tape, Mr. Brown can be heard saying to an unseen aide, after having stepped into his car: “That was a disaster. You should never have put me with that woman. Whose idea was that?” He added, “It was just ridiculous.” The aide suggested that British television “might not go with that one.” Mr. Brown responded, “They will go with it.”

In response to the aide’s question, “What did she say?” Mr. Brown replied, “Oh — everything — she just was a bigoted woman.”

During her exchange with the prime minister, Mrs. Duffy had said: “You can’t say anything about the immigrants, because you’re saying that you’re… but all these Eastern Europeans what are coming in, where are they all flocking from?”

Mr. Brown apparently did not realize that the Sky News microphone he was wearing was still on. Sky News, which made the audio public, is owned by Rupert Murdoch’s News Corporation. Another Murdoch property, The Sun, dealt Mr. Brown a blow several months ago when the popular tabloid decided to support his opponent, David Cameron, in this election.

Andrew Sparrow explained on his Guardian live blog:

Brown was in Rochdale doing a television interview about the deficit. As he was speaking, a woman called Gillian Duffy, a 65-year-old Labour voter, heckled him about the subject. He engaged her in conversation and they had a rather awkward chat that was filmed live on TV. It was a bit excruciating — mainly because she seemed to be criticizing him for everything – but eventually she said local schools were getting better.

Here is video of the complete conversation between Mr. Brown and Ms. Duffy:

Mr. Brown’s soon-to-be-viral encounter with Ms. Duffy comes just one day after his chief rival, David Cameron, who leads the Conservative Party, faced a similar awkward debate with an aggrieved voter who complained about his education policies.

Reporters in Britain complained that the first two televised debates featured too many American-style anecdotes about anodyne encounters with voters from the party leaders, who seemed to meet only ordinary people who agreed with them. Thursday’s final debate could now feature the names of these ordinary voters who have given the leaders of both the Labour and Conservative Parties a roasting this week.

Update | 8:23 a.m.: Mr. Brown’s remarks are being reported and dissected in great detail across the Web and Britain’s 24-hour news networks. During an appearance soon after the off-camera grumbling, Mr. Brown was forced to listen to tape of his comments during this excruciating live interview on BBC radio.

A BBC live blog reports that a spokesman for the prime minister said: “Gordon has apologized to Mrs. Duffy personally by phone. He does not think that she is bigoted. He was letting off steam in the car after a difficult conversation. But this is exactly the sort of conversation that is important in an election campaign and which he will continue to have with voters.”

Reporters also pressed the woman for her response on live television. She described herself as “disappointed” and said that she no longer planned to vote, having previously said that she hoped that Mr. Brown would remain Britain’s Prime Minister.

Ms. Duffy added that she was a supporter of Tony Blair and thought that Mr. Brown had done a good job in his previous role as Chancellor of the Exchequer, in charge of Britain’s treasury. She responded to reporter’s question about what she thought of Mr. Brown’s character by saying, “I only met him for two minutes… four minutes.”

Andrew Sullivan points to this video on The Telegraph’s Web site of Mrs. Duffy hearing from reporters what Mr. Brown said:

Here on The Lede, readers are discussing whether Mr. Brown may have met his “Joe the Plumber” in the comments thread below. That is a question we asked yesterday about Mr. Cameron’s encounters with two voters this week.

As a colleague in the Times newsroom mentions, in some ways the moment also echoes an exchange, late in the 2008 presidential campaign in the United States, between John McCain and one of his supporters who expressed fear of a Barack Obama presidency because, she said, “he’s an Arab.”

Update 2 | 10:48 a.m.: The BBC’s live blog has just streamed live video of Mr. Brown telling reporters outside the home of Gillian Duffy that he made a personal apology during a just concluded 45-minute visit to her house. As The BBC notes:

The prime minister says he is “mortified” at what happened. He says he is a “penitent sinner”, who misunderstood what she had said to him earlier and that she has accepted his apologies.

Here is the video, from ITN:

There is now a scrum of television crews outside Mrs. Duffy’s house, waiting to see what she has to say about the meeting. According to a Labour press officer she has asked the media to get off her doorstep and may not appear any time soon. The BBC notes that Mrs. Duffy had said after meeting Mr. Brown that she intended to mail in a postal vote for his party, before hearing his comments and saying that she would not vote at all. Reporters are now speculating about whether they will soon see her walk from her house to a nearby mailbox with her postal ballot.

Update 3 | 12:25 p.m.: Whatever Mrs. Duffy now chooses to do with her ballot, the size of the reaction to today’s encounter from the British media suggests that Mr. Brown is now quite a bit less likely to get reporters to change their focus from the personalities of the candidates and the theater of the debates to a sober discussion of the issues. On Sunday, Nick Robinson of The BBC reported on his blog that Mr. Brown’s party had drafted a letter of complaint to British broadcasters about their coverage but failed to convince the other major parties to join them in signing it. Here is the draft text of that letter:

To: BBC, ITV, Channel Four,

If there is one thing which all parties can agree on it’s that the televised leaders’ debates have been a welcome development which has given a real sense of energy and excitement to the election campaign. However, as we reach the final stages of the campaign we also share a common belief that the focus on the debates, both the process surrounding them, and the polling before and after which they have attracted, has dramatically reduced the amount of airtime dedicated to the scrutiny of the policies of the parties. This is particularly so in the case of the main bulletins which remain the main source of news for many people.

We feel that whilst our manifestos were fully, fairly and properly covered, since then the usual specialist examination of specific policy areas has not been done. We are writing to broadcasting organisations with a public service remit to ask you all to ensure that during the last ten days of the campaign your programmes analyse our policy proposals to the same level of detail as at previous election campaigns.

If the public are not exposed to the different policy details and arguments which we are presenting we are concerned that you will not be fulfilling your traditional duty of explaining and probing the plans of all the main parties. If the public don’t hear the arguments we believe that, despite the impact of the debates, many will still be in the dark as to the differences between our plans and values.

We are copying this letter to Sky News.

Update 4 | 4:12 p.m. And: scene. On its live election blog, The BBC reports:

Gillian Duffy is being represented by a public relations agent and will not be giving any further comment this evening on her dealings with the prime minister, the BBC understands.