People admire, even respect David but like Ed, his younger brother, more. Ed is the friend you always wanted, David is the analyst and policy-producer no party can do without. David — never Dave — has the party's thinkers around him, the cerebral Douglas Alexander and the strategic Jim Murphy. Ed is backed by the back-slappers, the folksy folk even if he is as much a Primrose Hill pointy-head as his brother. Labour's London saloniers such as Helena Kennedy are supporting Ed. They have spent Labour's years in power in some misery as they prefer to be Guardianistas in opposition. The Guardian's endorsement of Clegg in the general election has cost it its credibility as a paper of the Left. Now its ageing stable of columnists — they seem to have been there for centuries — are promoting Ed M as the closest they can get to someone who will follow their line.

Ed Balls has had the best parliamentary leadership campaign thanks to the botched way Education Secretary Michael Gove handled the announcements on school building funding and his rushed-through academies legislation. Had the party won, a Labour education secretary would have made similar announcements. But Gove, so smart and savvy in opposition, has turned out to be an unlucky minister in terms of his handling of the Commons. Balls, who is a poor speaker, has grown in stature. While he cannot win the leadership, he is assured a shadow cabinet place. Many mutter privately that Mrs Balls, Yvette Cooper, would have been a better candidate and this couple will remain a fascinating force in politics for years to come.

Andy Burnham has the longest eye-lashes in the Commons and although every bit a product of the non-Eton production line for the political elite, he hams up his Lancashire roots to good effect. He genuinely likes the party, its MPs and its activists and gave generously of his time for off-radar party meetings up and down the country in his years as a swiftly promoted cabinet minister.

The big loser is Brown's bruiser Charlie Whelan. He has boasted about delivering two million Unite union members to Brown's preferred choice, Balls. But unions know that Brown did little for them as Chancellor and guaranteed Labour losing power by insisting on his divine right to stay in No 10. To Whelan's horror, the Unite executive ignored his entreaties and nominated Ed M. But union members still vote as individuals in a secret ballot and they like everyone else will ask a simple question: does Labour want a PM-in-waiting, either because the coalition may not last for internal political reasons or because, like Edward Heath's government, it cannot rise to the challenge of external shocks and domestic discord? Or does Labour want a leader of the opposition who will tell the party what it wants to hear but move it out of its core 30 per cent electorate?

David M is best suited to the first task, Ed M to the second. Is it too late for a fraternal job-share? And once the new man is in, have the last four months of Labour unity and harmony been a false dawn? Will the band of brothers break into the squabbling, quarrelling haters that helped to keep Labour in opposition for 13 years after 1951 and 18 years after 1979?