Tonight:
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- Tories: 'Glaring holes' in pledges made by Brown
- ES comment: Gordon Brown's morning after the night before
- Reaction: Brown speech turns The Sun Tory
- Greenslade: Marr should apologise to Brown over health
- Anne McElvoy: Gordon Brown's shift towards a Two Nation Britain
- Election: PM may use 'scaremonger' tactics in campaign
An angry Gordon Brown turned on the media today as his fightback ran into trouble.
The Prime Minister lost his cool on live TV and tried to walk off at the end of an interview while still connected to a microphone.
At one stage he told Sky News's Adam Boulton: “You are sounding a bit like a political propagandist yourself.” At another point, he was in such a hurry to leave a BBC interview that he stood between the startled presenter and the camera.
He said Boulton, Sky's political editor, seemed to “obsess” about the Labour leadership and snapped: “You have not given me the chance to talk about the economy.”
Mr Brown's angry morning was fuelled by learning that The Sun has withdrawn its support for Labour. Today, during a round of interviews on Sky, GMTV and the BBC, he kept complaining he was not being allowed to make his case or answer questions in full.
Asked about a comment from Lord Mandelson that the public could not see through a “filter” at the Prime Minister's real character, Mr Brown commented acidly: “He was probably talking about the media.”
At the end of his Sky interview, the Prime Minister looked furious when the cameras turned off and he tried to walk away. However, he still had a microphone clipped on and did not realise he was supposed to remain in the same seat for his next interview, this time with the BBC's Sian Williams. Mr Brown complained to Boulton: “Look, Adam, we are going through a recession — I don't think you asked about that at all.”
Asked to guarantee he would not step down as Premier before the election, he said tersely: “I have got a job to do and that's the job I'm going to do.”
He said his personality was not the issue and when Boulton persisted, he interjected: “It does obsess you.”
At the end of the interview, he stood up while the BBC's Williams was still speaking to the cameras and in his haste to exit stepped between her and the camera.
Williams, clearly startled, tried to smooth over the gaffe, saying: “You can stay where you are if you want.”
Mr Brown told Sky: “I try to get my message across, it doesn't help when the newspapers try to translate it into something different to what it is.”
The Sun turned on the Prime Minister and Labour's record in a front page, five inside pages and a pull-out. Mr Brown told GMTV: “I think Sun readers actually, when they look at what I say, they will agree with what I said.”
Asked whether the tabloid's support could decide the next general election, he added: “Obviously, you want newspapers to be for you. We would have liked everybody to be on our side, but the people decide. I've got an old-fashioned opinion that you look to newspapers for news not opinions.”
Power of The Sun in election battles
* The Sun sells more than three million copies a day. It claims a readership of 10 million — many likely to be swing voters.
* It claimed it helped swing the 1992 election that kept John Major in power. On election day its front page pictured Labour leader Neil Kinnock's head in a light-bulb with the headline: If Kinnock wins today, will the last person to leave Britain please turn out the lights.
* Alastair Campbell revealed how he and Tony Blair canvassed News International chief Rupert Murdoch to win The Sun's backing ahead of the 1997 election.
* In May, The Sun joined David Cameron to call for a snap poll over the expenses scandal.
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