within the government. However, Prodi's government fell after only two years following tensions within its majority caused by the resignation of the Minister of Justice, Clemente Mastella. Following the 2008 Italian general election, which saw a victory of the centre-right, Letta returned the post to his uncle, when the Berlusconi IV Cabinet was sworn in. Leadership election candidacy In 2007, together with other The Daisy's members, Letta joined the Democratic Party (PD), the new centre-left party, born from the union between The Daisy and the Democrats of the Left. Having been a founding member of the party, Letta run in the first leadership election, which was held as an open primary. He announced his candidacy in July 2007 through a YouTube video. After a few weeks from the announcement, he compared the PD to Wikipedia, stating: "As in Wikipedia, even in the PD each of the hundreds of thousands of members must bring their own contributions, their own skills, which in certain fields are certainly more important than mine and those of the other leaders of the centre-left." In support of his candidacy, Letta founded the 360 Association, a centrist and Christian leftist group, mainly composed by former members of The Daisy. Letta's candidacy was supported by prominent members of the Italian centre-left, like Francesco Cossiga, Paolo De Castro, Gianni Pittella, Vito De Filippo and many other former members of The Daisy. Moreover, Letta's faction was composed by politicians considered close to Prime Minister Romano Prodi, a Christian leftist professor and founding father of the Italian centre-left. However, Letta had to face the politician who, more than any other, had worked to the formation of the Democratic Party and who was unanimously considered the future leader of the centre-left, Walter Veltroni, the incumbent Mayor of Rome. In the primary election, Veltroni won by a landslide with 75.8% of votes, followed by the former Minister of Health Rosy Bindi with 12.9% and Letta with 11.0%. After the primary election, Veltroni appointed Letta national responsible for labour. In May 2008, after the defeat in the 2008 election, Letta was appointed Shadow Minister of Labour and Social Policies in the second and last Shadow Cabinet formed in Italy. Deputy Secretary of the Democratic Party During the leadership election of 2009, Letta supported the eventual winner, the social-democrat Pier Luigi Bersani, being appointed Deputy Secretary by the party's national convention. In June 2010, Letta