BRITAIN: Labour delegates gave Tony Blair a standing ovation as he repelled Chancellor Gordon Brown's "challenge" and defended his record on Iraq, writes Frank Millar in Bournemouth
Tony Blair yesterday repelled Chancellor Gordon Brown's ambitions as he laid his own leadership on the line and challenged the Labour Party to renew itself and claim an historic third term.
Mr Blair defied predictions and won a rousing ovation for what was his tenth and most difficult leadership speech to the Labour Party conference.
Mr Blair faced his opponents over Iraq - telling them that he understood their disappointment, hurt and anger - but that he "would take the same decision again".
Signalling no retreat from his government's controversial health and education reforms - "I can only go one way. I've not got a reverse gear" - Mr Blair warned his party against politicians peddling popular things and easy options.
And in a seemingly direct response to Mr Brown - whose speech on Monday was celebrated for more than 60 references to "Labour" values - Mr Blair declared: "New Labour was never a departure from belief."
Acknowledging the swirling speculation about his prospects and the eventual succession, Mr Blair told conference: "I know it's hard for people to keep faith. Some of the people may have a different take on me. But I have the same take on them. I trust their decency. I know I am the same person I always was, older, tougher, more experienced, but basically the same person believing the same things.
"Policy you calculate, leadership comes by instinct."
In a sweeping embrace of the domestic and international controversies which have engulfed his government Mr Blair warned his party against a return to internal dissension: "I believe the British people will forgive a government mistake; will put the media onslaught in more perspective than we think; but what they won't forgive is cowardice in the face of a challenge."
Mr Blair told conference delegates they would not be fighting "the hard left" at the next election but the "hard right" in the form of a Conservative Party which would oppose them on immigration, Europe, and, above all, on tax.
"They'll say: 'You put the money in and nothing happened'. That's why they run down the National Health Service. Because they know if we can change our State schools and our NHS for the better, then they're back where they've never been in one hundred years 'til now, a party of Opposition and not even a good one at that."
Mr Blair posed the question: "When do Tories succeed?" He replied: "They succeed when people believe politics can't change lives. But we know it can because we see in the faces of the New Dealer and the pupils and the patients and the poorest of our world that politics can make a difference."
Mr Blair cautioned his colleagues as he recalled the events in the same Bournemouth conference hall in 1985 when the then Labour leader Mr Neil Kinnock confronted the Militant Tendency.
"Of course today it seems absurd, doesn't it," said Mr Blair: "Militant, Arthur \, all that nonsense." But Mr Blair remembered then - at what proved the beginning of Labour's "journey" into government - wondering if it was the beginning, or the end, for Labour.
"What I learned that day was not about the Far Left. It was about leadership. Getting rid of the false choice; principles or no principles and replacing it with the true choice. Forward or back. I can only go one way. I've not got a reverse gear. The time to trust a politician most is not when they're taking the easy option. Any politician can do the popular things. I know, I used to do a few of them."
Mr Blair acknowledged that Iraq had divided the international community as it had divided his party, country, families and friends. "I know many people are disappointed, hurt, angry. I know many profoundly believe the action we took was wrong. I do not at all disrespect anyone who disagrees with me. I ask just one thing; attack my decision but at least understand why I took it, and why I would take the same decision again."
Mr Blair invited delegates to imagine they were a Prime Minister in receipt of intelligence about Iraq and the whole murky trade in weapons of mass destruction (WMD). It was a matter of historical fact that Saddam's regime had not just developed, but used such weapons and lied consistently about it.
Mr Blair went on: "And I see the terrorism and the trade in WMD growing. And I look at Saddam's country and I see it's people in torment, ground under foot by his and his sons brutality and wickedness. So what do I do? Say 'I've got the Intelligence but I've a hunch it's wrong?' Leave Saddam in place but now with the world's democracies humiliated and him emboldened."
Mr Blair believed the security threat of the 21st century was not from countries waging conventional war, but from "chaos" and "fanaticism defeating reason".
Suppose the terrorists repeated September 11 or worse, he challenged. Suppose they got hold of a chemical or biological or nuclear dirty bomb, "and if they could, they would".
What then? "And if it is the threat of the 21st century, Britain should be in there helping confront it, not because we are America's poodle, but because dealing with it will make Britain safer," said Mr Blair.
Labour conference managers last night bowed to pressure for a debate on Iraq, which will be held later today.
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