Exposed: The Gordon Brown conspiracy

They must have been aware, as we were, that his longevity as a Chancellor was down to three things.

First, he inherited an economy that, thanks to years of hard graft by the Tories, was in rude good health.

Second, we then experienced one of the most prolonged periods of economic boom in modern history.

And third, that Granita deal meant that even a man as duplicitous as Tony Blair could not get rid of him.

Mr Blair, like every one of his New Labour colleagues, must have known that while the Scotsman was surfing an economic boom he was also placing the future of our nation in serious jeopardy.

There was the profligate spending on education and the NHS with no identifiable improvements in standards; the massive expansion of the public sector which has saddled the taxpayer not just with unprecedented salary bills but with terrifying pension commitments.

And there was the fuelling of growth by encouraging personal debt, the full catastrophic results of which we still waiting to witness.

Even his detailed tinkering was disastrous.

The deeply flawed new financial control regulations he introduced led directly to the collapse of Northern Rock.

We knew which way this monstrous incompetence was leading. So every man jack of the New Labour army must have known also.

So when it came to the moment when Mr Brown was to step over the doorstep of No 10 why was no voice raised in doubt?

Why was every one of them prepared to stand aside while a man they must have known was utterly unsuited to the job of being our Prime Minister was ushered into office?

The answer can only be naked ambition, unspeakable cynicism - or both.

They knew that if they tried to stop Brown and failed, they had no future in Government. They also calculated that when his incompetence became terminal it would be better to be close at hand to launch their moves for future advancement.

So, whoever follows Foreign Secretary David Milliband in launching bids to take power in the coming weeks and months, they will all share one thing in common.

They were all part of the Brown Conspiracy.

They are all tainted by the pact of silence that, at a moment in history when we desperately needed clear and decisive leadership, foisted upon us a dangerously duff Prime Minister.

So we know already that, whatever promises of new dawns and pledges of new beginnings they come up with, they have already failed the first and most critical test.

When it comes to a choice between self and country, we know which they will choose.