10 things you didn't know about Labour, from Gordon Brown's pollster

The Times reportedly paid £350,000 to serialise Lord Mandelson's book. My budget for book serialisations is rather more modest – but I did manage to wangle a copy of Deborah Mattinson's book, Talking to a Brick Wall, and it's definitely worth a blog.

Mattinson was involved in polling and focus group research for Labour for 25 years, and describes herself on the dustjacket as "chief pollster to Gordon Brown", although the book reveals that they fell out before the 2010 election.

It's not the best book on New Labour, but it contains more insight and less bile than many memoirs and probably deserves more attention than it has received.

The Sunday Times has published an extract, about Brown's decision not to have an election in 2007 (paywall), and the Mail on Sunday has extracted a story about how Brown's aides tried to make him appear more human. But there are other titbits worth mentioning, and here are 10 of them:

1. Gordon Brown came close to announcing a graduate tax and community national service. Mattinson says that in 2004, when Brown expected to replace Tony Blair as prime minister, she was asked to research with a focus group the reaction to a statement that he might make when taking over.

It said that 'we made a mistake by introducing tuition fees, and that this would be ended, replaced by a graduate tax'. It observed that 'we need to give young people the discipline and responsibility gained after the second world war by taking part in national service' and that 'I will introduce a new community national service – a gap year where all young people, not just the well off, can become involved in community projects at home ... learning new skills and a new sense of purpose'.

Reaction was very favourable. Mattinson does not explain why Brown dropped these ideas when he did eventually become prime minister.

2. Brown ignored focus group evidence when he cut income tax by 2p in the 2007 budget. Mattinson researched this option before the budget and found voters thought it was "too good to be true".

She says the research showed that cutting inheritance tax would be more popular. Brown ignored her findings, reduced income tax and did not cut inheritance tax. "It was a rare example from that period of GB ignoring focus group feedback," she says. After the budget, voters responded badly and Brown achieved his first ever negative rating as chancellor.

3. Brown was obsessed with slogans. "GB loved slogans and believed them to be imbued with a mystical power capable of persuading the most intransigent voter," Mattinson writes. "No matter how many times he was told that words must be matched by actions if they were to persuade, still he searched tirelessly for the perfect summation of his position."

4. Labour's 2010 election slogan – "a future fair for all" – was confusing. "Voters misunderstood, thinking that this might refer to some sort of futuristic theme park – a 'future fair'," Mattinson writes.

5. Brown tested a passage referring to his old school moto ("I will try my utmost") before using it in the speech he gave when he became prime minister in 2007.

6. Brown commissioned focus group research in 1996 into putting up taxes on those earning more than £100,000 because he did not trust the research carried out for Blair saying this would be unpopular. Mattinson convened some focus groups, but they showed that the Blair research (carrried out by Philip Gould) was correct. "The findings were surprising and somewhat disappointing for GB and the team," Mattinson writes.

7. Alan Milburn was not told when Blair agreed that Brown would replace him as head of the 2005 election campaign. "The first that Alan Milburn knew was when GB's team appeared, unannounced, to take charge of the 8.30 strategy meeting that Monday," Mattinson says.

8. Labour considered offering free tickets to the Dome as a reward for people joining the party. Mattinson was asked to conduct research into how members would respond to having free Dome tickets, or vouchers for other attractions, included as part of the membership package. "Party members ... were frankly outraged by what they saw as attempts to 'bribe' them," she writes.

9. Mattinson thinks politicians now have to be likeable to be successful. She says that, in the 1980s, Margaret Thatcher was admired as a leader, even though voters did not want her as a friend. But attitudes to leadership changed, she says, and attributes such as empathy became more important. "Is it possible to be a successful politician nowadays without attracting some level of public warmth? My judgment would be that it is not," she writes.

10. Research in the 1980s concluded Labour party members were "a bit weird". Mattinson says that she commissioned a study to enable the party to learn more about its membership. The woman who conducted the research spoke to party members all around Britain and made a worrying discovery. This is what she told Mattinson:

Basically, they are all a bit weird. I mean, what they had in common wasn't their political opinions – they covered the whole spectrum, from centre-left to far left – they weren't united by any ideology or political belief.
No, it was that they were all slightly strange people ... strange personally, I mean. They were people who really did want to spend their evenings sitting in church halls or community centres agonising over quite arcane points of detail.
And they weren't just doing it that night, but every night – the committee for this, the committee for that, the council, whatever. They were sort of lonely and socially odd.