Tories desperate to halt Brown

2007-09-30 14:15

Blackpool - Britain's main opposition Conservatives gather for their annual conference on Sunday, desperate to find a way to trouble Prime Minister Gordon Brown amid growing talk of snap elections.

Under their young and media-friendly leader David Cameron, the Conservatives were riding high in opinion polls before Brown succeeded Tony Blair in June, having rebranded themselves as green and shed their "nasty" party image.

But since Brown moved into Downing Street on June 27 his ruling Labour Party has gone from strength to strength, buoyed by widely-praised handling of a series of crises - leaving the Tories shell-shocked.

A weekend opinion poll gave Brown's party a huge 11% lead over the Tories - and now the new prime minister is reported to be seriously considering calling early elections within weeks.

There is even speculation he could try to wreck the Conservative conference by naming the poll date during the Tories' four-day gathering in the north-west English seaside resort of Blackpool.

A disastrous conference marked by a fresh outbreak of Conservative infighting - always fatal to their election hopes - could convince Brown to call a vote.

Seeking to shake off the legacy of three general election defeats in a row and present themselves as a totally overhauled party, the Tories have recently produced a series of policy reports setting out new proposals.

In a sign that Cameron believes the conference is gearing up for a general election, he wrote in the handbook: "This week I want to see the most serious policy debate that this party has ever had.

"I hope that this week, with your help, we will take a big step towards our next manifesto and the change of government that our country badly needs."

But he faces a huge task to reinvigorate a party which has been in the doldrums since Brown took over.

No limelight

While the prime minister toiled through the British summer calmly heading the response to attempted terror attacks, floods and foot and mouth outbreaks, Cameron has been muscled out the limelight.

When flooding struck his own constituency, Cameron was in Rwanda on what appeared to be yet another do-gooding mammoth photo-opportunity which turned into a public relations flop.

The shrewd Brown has tried to form an all-encompassing government, bringing in outsiders and members of the opposition to advisory roles. Some Conservatives have joined in, taking the sting out of Tory attacks on Labour.

And Brown invited former prime minister Margaret Thatcher to tea, leaving senior Tories scrambling to claim their connections to the Conservative icon.

Forty-year-old Cameron, who has been dubbed the "heir to Blair" for his slick, telegenic style, had previously tried to distance himself from Thatcher in his efforts to present himself as a clean break from the past.

Norman Tebbit, the right's veteran Thatcherite standard-bearer, emerged this week to pronounce Brown as Thatcher's heir in a timed blow to Cameron, calling the Conservative leader and his circle "intellectually very clever but they have no experience of the world whatsoever."

Cameron's ability to keep the lid on such infighting could be crucial to the conference's success.

Schwarzenegger

On Sunday, New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg speaks to the conference, while California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger will make an address via satellite link.

Monday's sessions debate the family, public services, economic competitiveness, "fixing our broken society" and childhood.

Crime, national and international security, globalisation and poverty and rebuilding democracy dominate Tuesday's agenda.

Wednesday focuses on quality of life issues before Cameron closes the conference with his keynote speech.

The set-piece could see the Conservatives go out on a high, or trigger the starting gun on a fourth straight general election defeat.

- SAPA