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And then he froze when Osborne promised to get rid of inheritance tax. And then copied them. At exactly the point his job was to defend it as a fair measure and fundamental to centrist thinking, never mind leftist thinking.
One of the reasons he was popular for that blip was people thought he was a bit further to the left than Blair was. (It's notable as well that a huge amount of people in 1997 thought Blair was further to the left than he actually was. I think people voted then for redistribution and Blair kind of talked them out of it.)
As it turned out we were confusing Brown being stolid with him being leftwing, we read too much into him taking his holidays in Devon instead of on Berlusconi's yacht.
Fintan
May would do well to remember that Gordon Brown was actually rather popular in his first few months. His mistake was in not being brave enough to call an election then. A lot of people, including, oddly, the PLP are talking as if an election is round the corner. Give May a chance to fail, wait and see what Brexit really means, that's the only hope Labour has, regardless of its leader.