Securing your position

One of the biggest criticism levelled at Gordon Brown over his 3 years in charge of the country was that he had no mandate for his policies. That the policies he proposed had never been voted over by the electorate in a general election. It was a pretty fair and damaging comment on Labours disastrous fall from grace since Tony Blair fled the coop, or should that be coup?
So now we have "Call me Dave's" solution to the problem of changing jockeys mid race for those in government.

BBC.

David Cameron has proposed that anyone who takes over as prime minister mid-way through a Parliament would have to hold an election within six months.

The Conservative leader has been a critic of the way Gordon Brown took over from Tony Blair and spent three years as PM without an election.
John Major and Jim Callaghan also both took over as PM outside of elections.
Mr Cameron's key proposal was that anyone taking over as PM following the death, overthrow or resignation of the previous incumbent would have to call an election within six months.
A new PM would be free to request a dissolution at any time during the six-month period, which would allow time for him or her to appoint a ministerial team and set out a programme for government and for Parliament to deal with any outstanding business, under the plans.
"It means putting the people in charge, I believe you should be in Number 10 because people have voted for you," he said.

Now there are some out there who might think this a good idea and he does have a point for the reasons I stated. However the cynic in me suspects a far more personal reason and that is to prevent unhappy MP's and party members bringing down an unpopular Prime Minister mid term for fear of losing a general election before the new incumbent can put things right. It may be that the new incumbent gets a new broom boost, but these things rarely last long and the unpopular policies very often remain as there's no time to deal with them before an election would have to be called.

So Is "Call me Dave" showing his democratic and pro fairness credentials? Well he is a politician, so I think not, it's just another way to protect his back if he becomes PM and has to make some very, very unpopular decisions.