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With the OAP protestor swiftly dispatched to a terrorist interrogation room, his point forgotten, the other main event at the Brighton Labour conference was Tony Blair's hint that he will serve of as much of the third term as possible, leaving Gordon Brown a few months to prepare for the general election. 
Yet the PM dauphin was on great form in Brighton. No controls were put on his desperation to prove what a free market toady he would/will be if/when Prime Sinister, making the gap between New Laboratory and the Tawdries narrower than ever. "I want Britain to be a house owning, share owning nation... I won't stop the reforms... well why don't I just fuck off now and stop pretending that I'm any sort of alternative? Because I am desperate. So desperate that I am not even prepared to be different to Blair, even though I am. And I'll still lose the next election, whether I follow the Blair mantra of public bad private good or propose a more socialist approach because the tabloids do not trust me and Murdoch and Bush don't like me." From that (only slightly embellished) speech, we can tell that Chancellor Brown has been politically neutered by his time twitching and ranting on the subs bench about how he was usurped as star striker by the android with the winning wires. Brown undoubtedly knows that the Americans are listening closely to him and that he will be keen to get across to them that his previous suggestion for an International Finance Facility to help relieve third-world poverty (which the US instantly rejected) was not that serious and that he can be trusted to ignore the domestic and international poor, while allowing a minority to continue to exploit society to a disproportionate and distorting economic extent. Anyone not able to join that minority through their own effort will just have to accept their innate inferiority - the free market is the final and only judge of ability and you still have the choice of who to give your money to, when shopping for toilet roll or a new stomach."The other thing that was manifestly obvious before the conference and compounded and repeated several times in it is that the Labour Party has so changed in both its membership and its structure that it no longer has the ability to change" Lenin's Tomb, 3 October
The new Academies and the increasing involvement of business and parents in setting the curriculum should ensure a larger and faster supply of emotionally frustrated and socially oppressed individuals to whom lower wages, entitlements (holidays, sick pay, pensions) and poorer working conditions can be successfully sold. After all, as Tony says in defence of Academies, "We have to equip people with the skills to compete in the modern globalised economy."
Gordon was apparently opposed to Academies but as there are likely to be at least 40 before he ever becomes Slime Administer this is another policy area where, conveniently, he'll have had the decision taken away from him. Like Iraq, ID cards, anti-terror laws, foundation hospitals, faith schools. Perhaps this is the real reason for Blair's fervour for fast legislative action in these areas: (assume demonic smile) "Get them in before GB takes over GB and he won't be able to undo them without me torpedoing his chances at the next election by claiming that he's taking the country and the Labour party back to the old days".
"If you want efficient public services, you have to surround them with democratic institutions. New Labour does quite the opposite" - Lenin
Brown is both supplicant and sycophant, with, ironically for someone with real Labour pedigree (rather than acquired, like Blair), his own version of the "divine right to govern" complex that motivates Touries. He was kept away from Number 10.4 Downing Sheet by underhand Mandelsonics and only now has he been able to assert his succession rights. This lengthy gap has led to some well documented tantrums, tears and pathetic sniping between the 'lower ranks' of the two camps (good euphemism for the Labour party as a whole, if it didn't derive from "star columnist" Richard Littlejohn's southern antipathy toward the northern working class).
But as Blair confirmed with bombast, and Cherie added to with her usual contorted grin, don't expect an abdication any time soon, due to those few things he wants to get through parliament. Oh, and he regards Tory leadership candidate David Cameron* (recently compared Islamic fundamentalism to Nazism, just to underscore his suitability) as his natural successor as prime minister, so there's an illustration of his real commitment to the Labour party and its values (values is, of course, as nebulous as the use and repetition of ‘reform. - these words mean nothing in isolation other than veiled intentions). In classic British political tradition, Blair is saying "come along now, we've had a fair time at the crease, better let the other chap [the Tories] have a go."
Yet Brown, screwed by circumstance, is ever ready to commit the final screwing.
* Maybe it hadn't occurred to you that Blair might actually prefer a Tory successor. Naturally, seeing David Cameron as his successor is not Tony's official stance but there is a gossamer whiff, called rumour, that says this
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