THESE are testing times for Tony Blair's "New Labour" Party. An odd observation, you might think, given the general consensus that they are more or less assured victory come the general election.
True, there is a continuing disparity between that opinion poll lead and actual votes cast. But for all that, Mr Blair's advantage seems unassailable. Just a fortnight ago the Conservatives registered their second worst ever performance in the English local elections. Some detect a measure of desperation in the latest Tory fight back, a massive advertising campaign offering, of all things, contrition for past mistakes.
"Yes it hurt: Yes it worked" is she high risk message proclaimed on the billboards this week, at a cost estimated between £500,000 and £750,000. It remains to be seen if voters are impressed by the assertion that the government's economic policies have produced she lowest unemployment rate of any European country.
One advertising chief was staggered by the arrogance. Another likened it to the old "age of the train" logo: "You can say it as often as you like, but people don't believe it if the trains are late, dirty and expensive." And Labour's deputy leader, John Prescott, thanked the Tories for a timely reminder of the recession band its cost to the British people.
But the Tories, presumably, have a game plan. And, for all the whingeing on the right, Chancellor Clarke's bravura performances at the weekend - vowing not to insult the electorate with a tax bribe - seems another necessary ingredient in the bid to recover their lost reputation as the party of fiscal prudence.
The Tory Party's finances, meanwhile, have undergone a dramatic transformation. The problems of overdraft seemingly behind them, reports say they have some £20 million to spend on the election campaign.
As that date with destiny draws closer, Dr Brian Mawhinney and his central office team will fight, mean and dirty. The Prime Minister will take to the high ground, as last weekend, warning in the direst terms that Labour's plans for constitutional reform spell, the breakup of the UK.
Dr Mawhinney and his foot soldiers, meanwhile, will ruthlessly exploit the tensions and contradictions suddenly in evidenced among Labour's high command. But it was no handiwork of the Conservative chairman which, put the "divided" face of Labour on display this week.
First came the public confirmation that Gordon Brown (shadow chancellor) is not speaking to Peter Mandelson (Labour's brilliant PR guru, or "the man who gave spin doctors a bad name" depending on your point of view).
This is rooted in Mr Mandelson's defection from Brown to Blair as the party prepared to elect a successor to Mr John Smith.
But that leadership contest, left other bruised egos in its wake. Robin Cook, by all accounts, is none too keen on Gordon. Mr Prescott has apparent reservations about Gordon, Peter and Robin, not to mention Harriet Harman. So it goes on. Clare Short is reportedly at odds with her No 2 over rail privatisation. The lack of fraternity is given sharper edge by the years in opposition. There is jockeying for power and influence come the day of government.
But important as the personalities are, there are also issues of policy. And we have been given glimpses of other behind the scenes baffles. Mr Prescott fires a warning shot at Mr Brown's plans for an expanded Treasury as the engine room for long term economic and social renewal. Chris Smith is locked in combat over Mr Brown's proposal to scrap child benefit for 16 to 18 year olds still at school, while pressing for an extension of the new Job Seeker's Allowance from six to 12 months.
To fuel the fires, Mr Michael Meacher says a single European currency could cost, rather than create, millions of jobs. Backbencher Austin Mitchell predicts the European crisis will land at Mr Blair's door early in the life of a Labour government. And an opinion poll suggests more than half Labour's MPs want to replace the monarchy with a republic.
Some Labour supporters fear it is on the big constitutional issues that Labour will come unstuck. Hugo Young, in the Guardian, rightly identifies the appeal of Mr Major's Scottish attack one Labour's raft of "constitutional doodling". The defence of "the constitution" is an issue on which the Tories will unite and fight - recognising, as does Scottish Secretary Michael Forsyth, that if its case is lost now it may never be recovered.
Against the Tories' certainty that everything it holds dear is in peril, Mr Young says the "reform" party "offers a message hardly anyone understands".
Against a proven Scottish demand for devolution, there is no evidence of English support for Labour's constitutional plans beyond a general feeling that the Tories are a rotten lot who have corrupted the political system.
And that, as the springboard for wholesale constitutional reform, is inadequate. The public, he argues, needs "to feel some ownership of the Big Idea" if a Blair government is to withstand "the Cassandras, of whom the Tory Party is beginning to mobilise a united army."
Some commentators have lamented this week's obsession Labour's personality battles as example of the media treatment politics as soap opera. But I have also invoked memories Crossman diaries, and special resonance in an account the Wilson years in which the story was disillusionment. Blair should be troubled by of disillusion settling in, even fore he gets to No 10.