Mr Brown insists that he’s been planning today’s postponement of October’s fuel duty increase for some time. Perhaps he’s a fan of this very blog, and has been planning it since May:

Every indication appears to suggest that Brown is going to give in to the current demonstrations on fuel pricing and – at the very least – further delay October’s increase in fuel duty. This will be unfortunate but necessary damage limitation, and will spin well for, ahem, ‘hard-working families’.

Indeed, as predicted, he even spun that it was a measure ‘to help families’. If only he’d listened to my earlier advice and announced it at the time of the local elections:

In his single exclusive interview, Mr Brown should have been armed with an arresting announcement – something along the lines of freezing fuel duty increases to help the poor … Pretty much anything would have moved the news cycle forward, and taken the focus away from Mr Brown and the disastrous election.

Instead, he’s decided to keep the announcement back to today, thereby achieving nothing but a pasting by those who say its another sign of the economy going down the plughole, and a good ol’ bashing by those who say it’s electioneering.

Good one, team Brown – Yet another remarkable own goal.