It's the global age. House prices have fallen in the United States, so British voters have punished their prime minister.

In last week's local elections in Britain, Prime Minister Gordon Brown got a bruising. His Labour Party lost many local councils, the biggest of all being London. There, the Conservative candidate unseated the Labour Mayor Ken Livingston. For the Conservatives, it was a good night. For the Liberal Democrats, it wasn't too bad.

For Labour, though, it was a catastrophe. Although the results have no impact on Brown's government - there were no parliamentary seats up for grabs - they bode ill for his future. The loss of so many local officers has depleted the party's election infrastructure. Brown, who had wanted to go the polls shortly after he unseated his predecessor Tony Blair, will now probably await the end of his government's term in two years' time.

A tortuous path leads from the American housing market to the British parliament. But in a nutshell, British banks had invested in the complex securities that had underpinned the US housing boom. With the housing bust now under way in America, the value of their portfolios has declined. As a result, the British financial sector is suffering. This, combined with a housing downturn in Britain, had prompted fears of recession.

Style but no substance

Brown's problem is that he has staked his claim to power on his reputation as a competent manager. Acquired during his long tenure as Tony Blair's chancellor - equivalent to our finance minister - Brown's moniker of 'Unflash Gordon' was offered as a tonic to the style but no substance image of Blair.

However, when a large building society almost collapsed last year, Brown's government botched the bailout. Other bungling only worsened his reputation. Then this year, when his chancellor announced that the government would abolish a lower tax-rate for poorer households, a rebellion broke out in the ranks.

The elimination of the 10 per cent threshold was a political gamble which backfired. By raising taxes from less well-off households, Brown had intended to reduce taxes on the middle classes.

However, he underestimated the degree to which his colleagues in the Labour Party remain loyal to Britain's less privileged citizens. An outcry within his caucus forced him into an embarrassing back-pedal, in which he had to offer concessions to poorer Britons. Regardless, he came out looking bad. The Conservative refrain that they could do better was heard by many voters.

On a roll

The Conservatives are indeed on a roll. However, whether they can convert their renewed popularity into a nationwide victory in 2010 remains open to question. First off, they have benefited from Labour's deepening unpopularity. But to date, they have not put forward a lot of policy alternatives. Now that voters are giving them a serious look, they will be more closely scrutinised.

Nowhere is this more true than in London. The Conservatives' claim that they could do a better job of governing than Labour will be put to the test in Britain's largest city. The Conservatives will cross their fingers. The new mayor, Boris Johnson, is something of a gaffe-prone, untested quantity. A poor performance on his part, especially if it coincides with an upturn in the economy in the next couple of years, will be the lifeline Brown hopes for.

Still, it's not much for him to hang his hopes on. "A week is a long time in politics" one of Brown's Labour predecessors in his post, Harold Wilson, once famously declared. However, Brown has enjoyed much more than a week in power, and he can't seem to get things right.