1 December 2014 Last updated at 14:44

Gordon Brown 'to announce he will stand down as MP'

Former Prime Minister Gordon Brown will announce later that he will stand down as an MP at the next general election, the BBC understands.

The Labour MP for Kirkcaldy and Cowdenbeath has been in Parliament for nearly 32 years.

He served from 1997 to 2007 as chancellor, in Tony Blair's government.

Prime Minister David Cameron said his 63-year-old predecessor, who was in Downing Street from 2007 to 2010, had "given a huge amount".

Labour was defeated under Mr Brown's premiership in 2010, recording its worst general election result since 1983.

He has kept a generally low profile after leaving office, making an intervention in a debate on the phone-hacking scandal and later entering the Scottish independence campaign.

Charity work

Mr Brown, who first entered Parliament in 1983, is expected to confirm his intentions in a speech to his constituency Labour Party later on Monday.

The BBC's assistant political editor Norman Smith said it was "not a huge surprise", with Mr Brown having been a "relatively infrequent visitor to Westminster" since the 2010 general election.

Since resigning as prime minister and Labour leader, Mr Brown has focused on charity work and his role as United Nations special envoy for global education.

He returned to the political spotlight during the latter stages of the Scottish independence referendum campaign with the result in the balance, helping to secure the vote against independence

A key part of his role was setting out a timetable for boosting the Scottish Parliament's powers if voters rejected independence, a timetable which was backed by the leaders of the three main pro-Union parties.

Supporters urged him to contest the leadership of the Scottish Labour Party but he declined, saying he did not want to return to frontline politics.

He held his seat with a majority of 23,000 at the last election.

As chancellor Mr Brown oversaw a decade of growth, made the Bank of England independent and played a key role in keeping the UK out of the euro.

He took over as prime minister from Mr Blair without a contest in 2007 but his premiership, which suffered when he decided at the last minute against calling a snap election that autumn, was dominated by the financial crisis and bank bailouts as the UK slipped into recession with a soaring deficit.

He saw off frequent rumours of challenges to his leadership by fellow Labour MPs, but his popularity never returned to the levels of his early days as PM.

The low point came during the 2010 election campaign, when he was recorded referring to a voter he had just spoken to in Rochdale, Gillian Duffy, as a "bigoted woman". He later went to Mrs Duffy's house in Rochdale to apologise, saying he was "mortified".

After the 2010 general election, he stayed on as prime minister for five days during negotiations between the parties.

With the Conservatives and the Liberal Democrats poised to form a coalition government, he resigned as prime minister and stepped down as Labour leader, saying the job had been "a privilege".

Mr Cameron said: "Gordon has given a huge amount in terms of public service and his contribution in government and Parliament, and I am sure he will go on contributing to public life even after he has left the House of Commons."