Blair 'believes Brown is a loser'

One of

Tony Blair's closest allies has said that the former prime

minister believes Gordon Brown "could never beat" Tory

leader David Cameron at the polls.

Blair also

described his chancellor and successor in Number 10 as a

"liar", Lord Levy said.

His comments -

categorically denied by Blair - came in the controversial

peer's memoirs, serialised in the Mail on Sunday.

Blair

"told me on a number of occasions he was convinced Gordon

'could never beat Cameron'," Lord Levy wrote.

He said the

former premier felt he could have won a fourth term had he not

stood down last summer.

"But

Gordon? 'He can't defeat Cameron,' Tony told me. Blair

believed Cameron had major strengths - political timing, a winning

personality and a natural ability to communicate to middle

England that Gordon would be unable to match," Lord Levy

added.

Blair's

spokesman said: "Tony Blair doesn't agree with the views

attributed to him by Lord Levy and fully believes Labour with

Gordon Brown's leadership can win the next election.

"Tony

Blair said when he stood down that he would be 100 per

cent loyal to Gordon Brown and that continues to be the

case."

Lord Levy's

claims heap further pressure on the prime minister as he struggles

to maintain his authority amid Labour rebellions over taxation and

the detention of terrorist suspects.

He said Blair

felt Brown was behind an attempt by Labour MPs in 2006 to oust him

from Downing Street and Labour treasurer Jack Dromey's claim

that he had been kept in the dark about the secret loans that led

to the 'cash-for-honours' inquiry.

"He kept

saying he had never realised how duplicitous Gordon was - and what

a 'liar'," Lord Levy wrote.

"I never

assumed - Tony certainly never did - that it was about Jack Dromey.

It was about Gordon Brown."

Lord Levy, who

as Blair's chief fundraiser was at the centre of the

'cash-for-honours' probe, claimed the ex-premier also knew

all the Labour lenders and donors and decided who got peerages.

Brown knew

about the loans as well, he said, and criticised the prime

minister's leadership himself.

"There are

people who are great number twos but when thrust into the

leadership role they cannot cut the ice," he said.

"Gordon Brown has not cut the ice."

Lord Levy's

intervention comes at a critical moment for Brown as he faces his

first electoral test in the local and London mayoral elections on

Thursday.

As he sought to

limit the damage to Labour from the 10p tax row, Brown promised

tonight he would always be "ready to listen".

Amid

predictions of a backlash at the polls in Thursday's local

elections, the prime minister insisted it was Tory and Liberal

Democrat councils that were letting down "hard-working

families".

In an article

for the Sunday Mirror, Brown said: "Whatever the differences

and debates of the past week, I know every member of the Labour

Party will be working flat out over the next few days to bring this

choice alive to people, and show them why it is vital to get out

and vote Labour on Thursday.

"And just

as we showed them last week in relation to the 10p tax rate and the

support we give to pensioners and workers on low incomes, Labour is

always ready to listen to people's concerns, and take action on

them."

Foreign

secretary David Miliband dismissed any suggestion that Brown would

have to stand down if Labour was heavily defeated in Thursday's

elections. "Definitely not," he told BBC1's Andrew

Marr Show.

Asked if it was

time for him to take over as Labour leader, he said: "It's

time for David Miliband to do a good job as foreign secretary

supporting a prime minister who is the right man to lead the

country forward."

Miliband called

for Labour unity around the prime minister.

"We know

what's fatal - if we fail to defend the leader, we lose sight

of our core convictions and we don't follow through on what we

started," he added.

Olympics Minister Tessa Jowell said that Brown remained "up to the the job" of prime minister, despite this week's climb-down in the face of a threatened revolt by Labour backbenchers.

In an interview for GMTV's Sunday programme, she acknowledged it was a "very difficult time" for the government after ministers were forced to promise an emergency compensation package for people hit by the dropping of the 10p rate.

But asked if she was "100 per cent certain" that Brown would still be Labour leader in a year's time, she replied "Yes", while brushing off suggestions that he could be toppled as a "kind of Westminster hysteria".

"He is up to the job of being prime minister, and talking, in the way Westminster gets into a frenzy, never destroys that. He is strong, he is very clear, focused and full of purpose," she said.

"What's important in a sense is not to become bound up in the high decibel exchanges of Westminster but to get out there on to the streets, on to the doorsteps, talk to real people, and for the business, the priorities and the process of government to be informed by the good sense of the British people."

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