Labour conference: 'Brown is boxed in to going the full distance'

GORDON Brown has to make the speech of his life to the Labour conference in Manchester tomorrow if he is to head off the growing calls from inside the party for him to go.

Labour's poll ratings have reached record lows and the Prime Minister has suffered the embarrassment of a government whip and a once-loyal minister resigning in disillusionment with his leadership.

But the financial earthquake which erupted around HBoS last week has, ironically, helped Mr Brown to fend off his critics. Political plotting to oust a Prime Minister looks particularly petty and inappropriate at a time of crisis.

The banking crisis also confirms there is no chance of a General Election being called until 2010. Mr Brown is boxed in to going the full distance. How he must rue the day, almost a year ago, when he finally killed off speculation about an early election last autumn, which he could almost certainly have won.

Many Labour politicians have now written off any chance of being returned to power when the election comes and some MPs are focussing on whether they can hang on to their own seats.

But those who have come out against Mr Brown in the past ten days have done nothing to improve their chances. They have spoken weakly about having "a debate" and have offered no alternative candidate to lead the party. All they have achieved is to undermine the Prime Minister at what is already a difficult time.

Some pundits have set the Glenrothes by-election as D-Day for Mr Brown. Losing what used to be a safe Labour seat right next door to his own would mean curtains for the Prime Minister, they say. But the SNP won the equivalent Fife Central seat from Labour at last year's Holyrood election so, incredible as it may seem, the real surprise would be if Labour could now hold on.

And Labour peer Martin O'Neill, usually seen as an ally of Mr Brown, has indicated the European elections in June next year could be the watershed: a drubbing then would probably mean a change of leader, he says.

But European elections usually see extremely poor turnouts and ousting a leader less than 12 months before the party must face the voters would look like panic.

The betting must be that unless something truly disastrous happens, Mr Brown will lead Labour into the next election. The question is whether his detractors will accept that and stop their plotting; their choice is between defeat and oblivion.