This last week has seen the culmination of an internal Labour party conflict that goes back nearly decades. Many internal party conflicts are about policy, unfortunately this one is not - this is all about power. This is about Brownites and Blairites battling it out over who is to lead the Labour party, this is not two party factions at war over any particular policy position or ideology.

That is what makes ordinary members of the Labour party so angry, the fact that this instability is being caused not by differences in view between those in power but by power itself - or, more correctly, the senseless lust for power that is not supposed to be a feature of our democratic party.  It is a dismal situation indeed.

I didn't vote for Brown when he ran for leader, nobody voted for Brown because nobody was ever given the opportunity. Given the choice, perhaps I would have voted for Brown, but I was never given that choice. Nevertheless, activists have stuck by the leader and the party - and so too should the cabinet. We all know that changing leader now would trigger a general election, and we all know that Labour would lose that election. If the recent election results are anything to go by, the defeat would be crushing and many good Labour MPs would lose their seats. Clearly, Labour cannot afford to have a general election now - especially given the anti-incumbent mood of the voting public, which is entirely understandable in light of recent events.

However the main reason why Brown must stay is because the proposed alternative, i.e. someone from the Blairite camp, would pursue exactly the same policies as the current leadership. Ideologically there is not, and never was, a single credible difference between the policies of the Blairites and those of the Brownites. A change of leader would therefore be nothing more than changing the team captain and bringing on a few subs at half time - essentially, the players are all still playing for the same team, still pursuing the same policies that have put us so disasterously out of favour with the British public.

Labour's best chance of a victory at the next election is to hope that Brown has finally understood the magnitude of the problem at hand. If we can take the lead on electoral reform, on constitutional reform, on the cleaning-up of MP's expenses and create clear dividing lines between us and the Tories, clear ideological choices for the voting public to make, then perhaps we have a chance of winning a historic fourth term in a year's time. 

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