Oh No Lord Peter Mandleson is back!

New Labour's very own Prince of Darkness has returned from his exile in Brussels and been welcomed back into the court, sorry cabinet of Gordon Brown (is this a case of keeping your friends close and your enemies closer?).

Not only that, but to get him into the inner circle. he has been elevated to the peerage in the process (HRH the Queen gets a lot of rotten jobs these days)!

Nick Robinson the BBC Political Editor, who's views I normally respect sees Mandleson as a real asset to the Brown Government
Quote:
'Mandelson brings huge strategic and presentational experience'.
Unquote
Hmm. I see Baron Mandleson as:

• A Self-serving Careerist Politician.
• Someone who has turned 'plotting and back stabbing' into a career plan and indeed art form (his 'bitchy remarks' made within the hearing of Journalists, form a small but telling insight into his pyche).
  
• A revolving Door Minister who after his first resignation should have disappeared from Public Life and after his second Resignation should have been consigned to the dustbin of History. Instead he was exiled to Brussels as Trade Commissioner.
  
• Having said that, as Trade Commisioner in Brussels, I suspect this post suited his Machiavellian nature for Plotting and Playing one off against the other. Also not a bad paying job in the bargain.

Under New Labour standards in public life have become something of a sick joke, but at least I thought Peter Mandleson's time on the Domestic Political stage had to be over. He was no longer an MP, surely there was no way back. Oh no - the instant peerage.

So once again the new age Machiavelli stalks the corridors of power, worse still he is once again a Minister of the Crown. One hopes that he will finds at least some time to do the job as starts his new plots and counts his continuing salary from Brussels and new Cabinet paycheque - but I doubt it.

See Peter Mandleson - Wikipedia Entry for more details on his Life and Career to date