Duncan Hamilton: Brown should go gracefully, and not as a desperate loser

No, not David Cameron's view of unyielding Gordon Brown, but Harold Wilson summing up Edward Heath's unwillingness to roll his piano out of Downing Street in February, 1974.

At least Heath won more popular votes back then – though he garnered four fewer seats than Wilson's 301. It enabled him to argue that he had a mandate of sorts to stay put. The present incumbent has no such justification or moral authority.

With his needle of support stuck so far adrift of Mr Cameron's, an act of chivalry – rather than entrenchment – is called for from Mr Brown. Instead, he is going to cling on to power until his fingernails bleed. Exactly like Heath.

Watching Thursday's results dribble in, I found it impossible not to think of Wilson, who often used simple sporting analogies to articulate complex thoughts. Listening to Labour's hierarchy, as it trooped slavishly on-message from one studio to another, there were also moments when I thought I must be hallucinating; perhaps because of sleep deprivation. I was struck by the number of Mr Brown's acolytes who kept insisting, as if repetition would make the rest of us believe such guff, that:

n The result wasn't too grim for them.

n It didn't necessarily constitute a defeat.

n The Conservatives had no authority to attempt to form a Government on the basis of it.

It was like trying to pretend (as Wilson would have recognised) that a 5-0 hammering was actually a decent 0-0 draw. That view was expressed with such a well-developed and superior sense of entitlement that it tipped into conceit. It was as though Mr Cameron turning so much of the battleground blue could be dismissed as merely irrelevant. The same tone was implicit yesterday in Mr Brown's defence of his position. Despite the beating he's taken – the haemorrhage of seats and his skimpy percentage share – he tried to pose as both irresistible force and immoveable object.

The repercussions of all this game-playing could shake the ground beneath our feet. Every election for more than half a century has been described as "the most important ever". In this case, however, it could be true.

The campaign resembled one of those thick and labyrinthine Victorian novels in which twists and turns abound and minor characters, such as Mrs Duffy of Rochdale, suddenly appear unexpectedly to play brief pivotal roles. The unfolding drama of the plot energised voters to the extent that even those with previously only a scant or tangential interest in the contest began to engage with it.

Of course, the level of expectation confronting any new Government is always in excess of what it can feasibly deliver. But it cannot be repeated loudly enough that one thing has to emerge from the tangled negotiations now taking place. The electorate must not be let down or disillusioned again. This is a turning point. If we refuse to turn, the potent threat to the process thereafter is apathy and anger on a phenomenal scale.

So far, it has to said, the signs are not favourable. There are three formidable hurdles to be cleared.

First and most obvious is the difficulty of screwing together a Government of disparate and ill-fitting parts. Even at its very smoothest – when just a single party is involved in pushing through legislation – the machinery of Westminster resembles a lumbering, Heath Robinson-style contraption. Pulling one lever merely initiates a chain reaction in smaller pulleys and wheels, which may – or may not – produce the desired end product.

As Wilson discovered, the odds are longer still when the Prime Minister has to rummage around the green benches for support, pluck out bits and pieces of policy and then try to tack them together to everyone's satisfaction. To say the least, the chance of creating something both effective and lasting is remote.

Mr Brown is obliged to negotiate with multiple parties; Mr Cameron, as he made plain in his eloquent and convincing speech, with only the Liberal Democrats. This is significant in itself. Even if Mr Brown's more complicated gerrymandering were to somehow succeed, the second factor is: At what cost?

The voters in England are already mightily suspicious of – and increasingly indignant about – the benefits and hefty investment channelled into the assemblies of Scotland and Wales. These are denied to regions such as Yorkshire, which nonetheless subsidise them through taxation.

No-one yet is prepared to tackle the straightforward question of whether MPs from outside English constituencies should be allowed to vote on issues affecting England alone. But – much worse – to function half-credibly, Mr Brown would have to "buy off" the minority parties of Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland with promises of cash for pet-projects – provided by a Treasury which is unable to afford them and bracing itself for unprecedented cuts and possible financial cataclysm.

Already, public sector money swills in torrents around Northern Ireland, the fortunate recipient of accumulated handouts higher than anywhere else. How much more would the English electorate tolerate before the injustice of such inequality began shredding the fabric of the Union – especially when these "favours" would be repaid against the sensitive backdrop of a hung Parliament?

Finally, wedged in between the difficulties of bringing together so many competing voices, and the fatiguing job of keeping the coalition in constant repair, is the need to reassure those voters who felt disenfranchised on May 6. This is the third task facing the next Government – and it is an urgent one.

The apparatus of voting could not be more Stone Age: ballot station, ballot box, ballot paper and the nub end of a pencil. It is beyond belief that anything so unsophisticated could collapse so abysmally. If this country can't organise a vote... well, the consequences are obvious enough to require almost no elaboration. It is ironic that an election which set out to restore faith and trust was unable to provide a ballot to thousands who wanted it. Talk about inept. Talk about outrageous.

More ironic still is this: The next Prime Minister will emerge from the less than ideal circumstances of handshakes and split deals. There is no doubt it ought, nonetheless, to be Mr Cameron at the head of an alignment between Conservative and Liberal Democrats. It would be cleaner that way; especially at a time of war and acute debt.

What of Mr Brown's fate?

I remember the unease shrouding Edward Heath's decision to limp on for nearly 72 hours after the polls closed. Because of it, he became trapped in the memory as a bad loser. Mr Brown should learn from him. He can either go gracefully so that nothing in his Premiership becomes him like his leaving of it. Or he can cling on as Heath did and look sour, grasping and desperate.

As Harold Wilson might have said: "It's time for an early bath, son."

Duncan Hamilton is a best-selling author, whose books on Brian Clough, Harold Larwood and JM Kilburn have been multiple award-winners. He is a former deputy editor of the Yorkshire Post