@Fatbloke on tour: Again you identify the problem succinctly. Mrs D was woefully reactionary and does not deserve the glorious progressive state forged for her by the Dear Leader with his own sweat and tears. Imagine, a pensioner more interested in immigration that financial regulation! In my local Working Men’s Club, all the talk is of gratitude for the tireless efforts of the Leader in leading the world out of recession. (After one too many pints of Old Steelworker’s Fraternal Fizzer, Nikolai Nikolaievich can even be heard expounding at length on neo-classical indogenous growth theory over the dominoes.)

Mrs D has not been paying attention to her educational broadcasts. As a first step we should stop her pension as a method of correction. Then she must be hounded relentlessly by the faithful press to ensure that no part of her private life can remain private. If you enter the public arena against the Dear Leader you are agreeing to play by The Big Boys’ Rules. The social contract is void. She deserves no mercy for her impertinence.

In comradely passion to the future!

I don’t think that Clegg will necessarily be damaged by these comments at all. The issues are not what is so shocking in this incident and may not even surface.

What is shocking is the PM’s total disrespect of a normal grass roots Labour supporter who asked him a couple of questions without any rancour.

His behaviour in brushing her off and then changing the subject to good families with the complete volte face as soon as the car door was shut, shows his absolute duplicity.

Mandelbrot will be devastated.

@fattie the issue is Brown’s contempt for the public…………..

And Clegg, his benefit will be (I think) what I mentioned a couple of days ago. Re-positioning, today by the BBC. They are all over this story, and they seem to be shifting from supporting Labour to favouring the LDs. So are a lot of Labour’s front bench. those who don’t think they are going to be the new leader. So is the Guardian and its readers. Clegg and his bunch are going to be crowned as the great hope of the left. Labour? Dumped.

Surely now time for Tories to go heavy on decentralisation themes and placing power in the hands of the people and not politicians.

Brown’s contempt for normal voters is astonishing!

It’s not really about immigration, it’s about engaging with ordinary people. The scandalous remark is ‘you should never have put me in with that woman’, not the ‘bigoted’. The election has any number of things which may not be mentioned so as not to frighten the horses. The press is as guilty as the pols for letting them get away with it.

interesting to see how Clegg tacles the question of immigration after Bigotgate! Immigration and the Euro are now high on the news agenda. I wonder how Clegg as a Europhile will deal with the contagion now spreading from Greece to Spain. The UK does not want to go anywhere near this train wreck. No doubt Clegg will have some vapid one liners[that a script writer of Neighbours would be proud of] directed at the gullable and politically immature potential Lib Dem voters.

May be now all three parties will accept the nations fears on immigration, and what they are demanding be done. It’s we who pay the bills, its us who have to face the cuts, so why shouldn’t we have our fears and what we want listened to without rude comments. This is a gaffe waiting to happen, Brown is no ‘people man’ we know that but this was far out of the norm one should expect from a PM. The woman tried to put her fears and explanation across best she could, she hadn’t the expertise of people coaching, just an ordinary woman who had been a lifetime Labour voter. Even she now realises the failure and the contempt they have for the electorate. The Labour party have been taken over by a Stalinist group and PR men, who have internally destroyed it, they no longer represent the working class people, they represent the immigrants who they have let in, specifically to get votes. I’ve voted for them for the Labour party for 50 years, but no more. This government have betrayed me, and those who trusted them, never again will they get my vote, for me it will be Ukip who say and speak the way most of the people feel in this country.

The Labour trolls are out in force on this one, probably because they realise that immigration is an emotive issue and there is profound anger concerning the government’s incompetence. All this nonsense about ‘casino capitalism’ and so forth is utterly irrelevant to this controversy. When immigration moves to a more central position in the public debate, Labour will reach one of its most exposed positions and be lacerated. I must confess, this is causing me extraordinary amusement ! Labour deserves everything it is getting and more, for the destruction that this government has been responsible for since they assumed office.

I wouldn’t be so optimistic.

Fact Hunt on Tour (of gentlemen’s conveniences),

If you smell a rat I suggest it’s the company you keep.

You want to dig into her backstory, presumably with the intention of destroying her with a smear campaign? How courageous.

Perhaps you should take your fluffing elsewhere?

Clegg will do his usual Janus, saying “it isn’t bigoted to discuss immigration”, then proceed to frame discussion in extreme Liberal-left terms, to the exclusion of common sense.

No he bloody won’t. The people who will be most turned off by Brown’s comments are, as the BBC identifies, Labour’s core vote. They will either not vote, as Mrs Duffy has chosen, or switch to the other progressive party.

Stop dreaming guys.