Via the Crown Blog the cringe making More4 News interview where Tamsin is asked three times if Gordon is “an asset or a liability?”:

After seeing some of the LibDem campaign literature and the undeniable fact that the Labour odds have lengthened even further, Guido has covered his bet taking the hit and cutting his losses on that Labour bet.

The LibDems are not repeating the mistake they made in the Mayorals. They attacked Boris when the public was moving towards the Tories. This election they are going with the popular flow and attacking Labour. Their advertising says “Send a Message to Gordon Brown”. They might take some votes from disillusioned Labour voters who can’t bring themselves to vote Tory. More bad news for Tamsin…

An ICM poll for the Mail on Sunday tomorrow will put it neck and neck in Crewe & Nantwich, with the Tories on 43% to Labour’s 39% and the LibDems trailing far behind on 16%. Believe it or not Guido has backed Labour on Betfair on the back of this, their 3.5 price seemed a bit rich given the narrow 4% difference.

What will have the mobile phone ricocheting around No. 10 is the startling finding that Labour voters would rather have Cameron than Brown as PM. Gordon is dead man ranting.

This is from an official Labour leaflet being distributed in the poorer socio-economic areas of Crewe & Nantwich. You can’t be wealthy and vote-worthy apparently. Do they realise that Gordon is a multi-millionaire?* Point 4 is real knuckle-dragging dog-whistle stuff. Surprised they didn’t stick on a picture of Gordon with a Union Jack and quote his “British Jobs for British Workers“ speech. Desperate times require desperate tactics…

Guido can imagine Stephen Carter telling a heavily sedated Brown on Wednesday after PMQs of the plans for the weekend:-

Carter : We’re going somewhere nice for the weekend, get some sunshine. We have booked a trip to the Eden Project in the South West, Cornwall, then on to Plymouth.

Brown: [rocking in his chair] What about the by-election? Where is it?

Carter: No by-election PM, we are going to see the flowers in Cornwall and visit an old peoples home in Plymouth. Take it easy, have a weekend break.

Gordon is on an official visit to Plymouth, which is 251 miles away from Crewe. Brown couldn’t be further away if he went to Edinburgh (242 miles), in any event he wouldn’t want to go for a weekend rest in Edinburgh now it is under Salmond’s control and Wendy is rebelling against him.

Whereas Cameron and Clegg are up in Crewe and Nantwich backing their candidates to the hilt, taking every local photo-op available, Brown’s handlers are keeping him as far out of sight as possible. No doubt fearful of the inevitable consequences of the Jonah curse of the one eyed son of the manse…

UPDATE : At the old people’s home, Gordon was introduced to Maisie Wright, 94. “Hello, I’m Gordon Brown, the prime minister” he said as he proffered his hand. “That’s nice” replied Maisie, “Wilf over there thinks he is Jesus Christ.” Old, but good.

23 year-old Robert Smith will be announced as the Green Party candidate shortly. He was selected after the person scheduled to be the candidate decided they did not fancy fighting a by-election in the full glare of publicity. The Greens didn’t fight the seat at the general election so this skews the psephological balance a little. Don’t expect a big upset…

The Labour Party’s efforts in Crewe and Nantwich to paint the local candidate as a “Tory Toff” required them to dress up a couple of Young Socialists in top hats and parade them around as fake toffs in an Andy Coulson style gimmick. Seems all of a bit of a waste of time when not far away they have a real Toff of their own they could have used.

Step forward Mark Fisher, Labour MP for Stoke-on-Trent, the Eton and Oxbridge educated son of a Tory MP is a gent to his finger-tips.

He would never have committed the faux-pas of wearing a grey topper either…

Two Young Socialists had a good wheeze dressing up as top hat and tails toting toffs to meet David Cameron and Edward Timpson off the train as they arrived to campaign in Crewe and Nantwich. Class war might seem like a good idea against two public schoolboys from privileged monied families.

Except Guido has the nagging feeling that it might it be a little unwise given that Labour have themselves chosen to use the hereditary principle in selecting Tamsin to fight the seat.

Tamsin Dunwoody is of course the privileged daughter of the Labour MP who held the seat until her death last month…

UPDATE : Guido’s co-conspirators comment that Tamsin’s grandfather, Morgan Phillips, was the General Secretary of the Labour Party, and her grandmother served as a minister in the House of Lords before being made the Lord Lieutenant of London. Tamsin is hardly working class…

The readiness of New Labour to cynically exploit the goodwill of Gwyneth Dunwoody’s constituents (where she had a significant following) hit a low with the hasty announcement that Labour will rush the election in record time. Now they have been caught milking tributes for partisan advantage.

The official local party website invites you to leave a tribute to her – nothing wrong with that. Guido cynically wondered why the online tribute form asks not only for your name, but your house number, postcode and email address? It seems Guido was right to be cynical…

Before she is in the ground they are electioneering. If anyone from Labour claims that it is just an innocent opportunity to leave a tribute to the much-loved former MP they are being less than honest. A close study of the data capture process reveals that it includes a sophisticated software routine designed to look-up and verify the postcode and collect the data for Labour HQ in London. This is not a spontaneous local initiative – it was designed by Tangent Labs, the Labour Party’s national e-campaigns software contractors. Don’t forget to include this work in your election expenses chaps….

The data will no doubt be used to help with e-campaigning in what could be a closely fought battle. This by-election will be a prototype for General Election e-campaigning strategies…

The unseemly rush to have the Crewe & Nantwich by-election can only mean one thing – Labour are worried. Guido can’t recall an election being called before the body was buried before.

They obviously hope to prevent the opposition organising themselves and exploit the warm goodwill that still lingers from Gwyneth Dunwoody. The selection takes place Friday morning with the candidate to be announced Saturday night.

It suggests that they hope to get all the bad news out of the way before the summer. In time no doubt for yet another Brown re-launch…

UPDATE : Iain Dale speculates as to why Fraser Kemp won’t be performing his usual by-election role.