Coming Out…

Evening,

Chairman Brown suffered his first ministerial casualty today, when the Minister of State for Scotland, one David Cairns resigned his post, citing concerns that Brown couldn't lead Labour to that magical fourth term success.

The resignation of Cairns hasn't come as much of a surprise to many political journalists within Westminister. Cairns worked as researcher to Siobhain McDonagh and served as a councillor in the London Borough of Merton before getting a seat in Scotland. McDonagh was the first of a substantial number of MPs within the Parliamentary Party to request nomination papers ahead of a potential leadership contest, later in the autumn.

Consider that at 11am this morning the BBC were reporting that Cairns had "no intention of resigning", you do have to wonder whether something was said in the intervening four hours to make Cairns resign, or was he leading the Downing Street Press Office on a endless hike…

Probably.

What it does mean now is that Chairman Brown is now vulnerable, in a way that he hasn't before. The numbers are stacking up, some sources are saying as many as 60. Brown needs to hope that he doesn't have to go up to Manchester next week, with this still on the agenda, as Conference could prove to be a very comfortable time.

It's up for grabs…