History > 2006 > UK > Politics (II - III)

Tories unveil their secret weapon:

'webcameron'

· Video blogging site to be modelled on YouTube
· Party hopes to reach disaffected voters online

Saturday September 30, 2006
Guardian
Will Woodward, chief political correspondent

David Cameron will today unveil radical plans to harness the power of the internet by reaching out to a blogging generation that is disaffected and disconnected from mainstream politics.

At the heart of the initiative, which is designed to make the Tories one of the most technologically progressive parties in Europe, is "webcameron" - a website for video blogs by their leader. Mr Cameron will provide regular clips with him speaking direct to camera, as well as written blogs and podcasts.

The site, www.webcameron.org.uk, will also feature guest bloggers - kicking off today with John McCain, the US presidential hopeful - and video blogs from members of the public that will be stored and shared online.

The Guardian has had advance sighting of the site, including Mr Cameron's first video blog, filmed yesterday, which shows him washing up in his kitchen while his family eat breakfast.

As he battles with noisy children and clears dirty plates into the bin, Mr Cameron says to camera: "I want to tell you what the Conservative party is doing, what we're up to, give you behind-the-scenes access so you can actually see what policies we're developing, the things that we are doing, and have that direct link ... watch out BBC, ITV, Channel 4, we're the new competition. We're a bit shaky and wobbly, but this is one of the ways we want to communicate with people properly about what the Conservative party stands for."

The site has taken ideas on sharing video and images from YouTube.com and flickr.com, and also social networking sites such as MySpace. Steve Hilton, Mr Cameron's closest adviser, and Sam Roake, a 26-year-old former Google staffer who is in charge of the party's web operation, have masterminded the development of the site alongside Head, a digital agency.

"Politics is absolutely a key part of the general cultural change that the internet has brought about," Mr Roake said. "Opening up like this involves a certain amount of risk but we're confident that on balance it's going to be a great thing - it heralds significant change in the way politics has been done.

"It very much represents the values of David Cameron's Conservative party, of openness and community. We see this site as being a way that people can engage with politics in a meaningful way on their own terms, and share a platform with David Cameron and thought leaders around the world on the guest blog, which we think is going to be very powerful."

Mr Cameron trialled his video blog on his visit to India earlier this month, short clips of him speaking to camera went on to the main Tory site, www.conservatives.com.

One senior official suggested a new video from Mr Cameron would appear perhaps twice a week.

But the party also wants to encourage different and often discordant voices from non-Conservatives. The site is branded in pink and consciously plays down the party message.

"From the word go the Cameron team saw the need to reorient the way we conduct politics, not just doing things for the traditional media," said a Tory official. "This is a real challenge to us to show that we understand the web: it's open, it's not spin, and we have got to take risks."

"You have to accept that people these days don't want to be badged in the same way: 'I'm Conservative' or 'I'm Labour' or "I'm Lib Dem.' I see us turning into a much more rounded campaigning organisation where it's not just about campaigning to get people elected, it's about campaigning to make change happen."

Today's move reinforces the way all parties are moving away from relying on their declining membership to execute policy and organisation.

Tories unveil their secret weapon: 'webcameron', G, 30.9.2006, http://politics.guardian.co.uk/conservatives/story/0,,1884396,00.html

How parties stack up on the web

Saturday September 30, 2006
Guardian
Ros Taylor

Labour

Hired Zack Exley, who worked on the Kerry-Edwards presidential campaign site, to advise on 2005 election online strategy. Subscribers to party's mailing list received emails from Alastair Campbell, Tony Blair and Labour-supporting celebrities encouraging donations. Labour.org.uk has also dabbled in anti-Tory humorous viral campaigns, notably DavetheChameleon.com, which trained a webcam on a reptile in a tank. Critics say the party sees the web as an advertising channel rather than an interactive space: recent efforts include a World Cup blog by Campbell and innocuous Q&A conference podcasts. Party chair Hazel Blears is "rethinking" Labour's web presence to appeal to under-35s

Conservatives

Ideological hiatus during the long leadership contest last year allowed unofficial blogs like Conservative Home to flourish. Central office is now trying to catch up. Ex-Google "maximiser" Sam Roake (he wrote copy for online ads) was hired to revamp Conservatives.com, which is still a work in progress. Party chairman Francis Maude will join four leading Tory bloggers for a "blog surgery" on Monday at the Bournemouth Centre. Keypads at every seat in the hall mean delegates and non-delegates alike can text and email comments during debates.

Liberal Democrats

The Lib Dems' online strategy, led by ex-City IT expert Mark Pack, is inspired by Howard Dean's use of MeetUp.com in the run-up to the 2004 US presidential elections. Flocktogether.org.uk is a site where activists can plan campaigns and local meetings.

    How parties stack up on the web, G, 30.9.2006, http://politics.guardian.co.uk/conservatives/story/0,,1884414,00.html

2.15pm

Defeat for government

over corporate killing

Thursday September 28, 2006
Guardian Unlimited
Matthew Tempest and agencies

The Labour leadership suffered its third and final defeat of its Manchester conference today, as delegates and unions demanded that company directors be made liable for the deaths of employees.

Delegates cheered as a rebel union motion sought to amend the legislation currently going through parliament as the corporate homicide bill.

Labour's leadership had also lost votes this week on council housing and NHS privatisation, although none are binding on the government.

The Transport and General Workers union called for legislation before parliament to be amended to ensure directors and senior managers were held to account.

But Labour chiefs defended the bill, which will be debated in the Commons next month.

They insisted that further union concerns could be addressed in an ongoing health and safety review.

The bill allows companies to be prosecuted rather than individuals and proposes a penalty of an unlimited fine rather than jail for individual bosses.

Moving the successful motion, Tony Woodley, the T&G's general secretary, said: "The bill completely and deliberately excludes from its scope the prosecution of negligent directors, guilty directors who will be handed a 'get out of jail free' card."

The government was "plain wrong", he angrily told delegates.

"They are pandering to the pressure from the CBI and the bosses.

"Organisations don't kill people. Incompetent, negligent, greedy bosses do. And they are quite literally getting away with murder," he added to applause.

Mr Woodley continued: "Where individuals are shown to be culpable, they should face prosecution for manslaughter.

"If death by dangerous driving deserves 14 years in jail, then the loss of a worker's life through the bosses' mismanagement deserves no less."

Mr Woodley said 10,000 people had been killed in workplace accidents in the last 30 years - including 212 fatalities last year.

Over the same period, just 11 company directors were convicted of manslaughter with five jailed, he added.

However, Labour's national executive committee said in a statement that directors would still be liable for manslaughter on an individual basis if they had been grossly negligent.

Defeat for government over corporate killing, G, 28.9.2006, http://politics.guardian.co.uk/labourconference2006/story/0,,1883224,00.html

6.30pm

Government defeated on NHS

Wednesday September 27, 2006
Guardian Unlimited
Hélène Mulholland and agencies

The Labour leadership suffered its second conference defeat of the day this afternoon when delegates passed a motion condemning government plans to privatise health services.

A rebel motion, condemning the "breakneck speed of change" in the NHS and opposed by the party's ruling national executive, was carried on a show of hands.

It followed a defeat earlier in the day when delegates called for more investment in council housing.

The vote came at the end of the stormiest debate so far of Labour's Manchester conference and as hundreds of health workers held a 24-hour strike in a bitter row over the privatisation of NHS Logistics, a supply arm of the health service.

Moving the successful motion, Unison's general secretary, Dave Prentis, warned of an NHS "in crisis" and attacked "market madness".

The health secretary, Patricia Hewitt, sought in vain to have the Unison motion revoked.

Carol Dean, of Tamworth constituency branch, put forward a separate motion supporting the government, accusing Unison of "going their own way" rather than reaching a consensus before today's debate.

During the debate, a round of speakers took to the platform to denounce privatisation in the NHS.

Fury broke out as Mr Prentis was prevented from completing his speech tabling the motion, in which he attacked the "dangerous change of direction" which saw competition and "divisive markets" penetrating the NHS.

The attempt to stop him from finishing his speech as he ran 30 seconds over his allotted time prompted Jack Dromey, the deputy general secretary of the T & G and treasurer of the Labour party, to come to the stage to describe the move as "discourteous" and "outrageous".

Mr Prentis used his five minutes to warn that a "national tragedy was unfolding" as the NHS saw daily reports of cuts and redundancies, staff dazed by a "permanent revolution" of change and restructuring and instability created as hospitals were forced to compete each other for patients.

Mr Prentis also condemned the decision to close NHS Logistics and outsource the supply provision of NHS equipment to a German "union-busting" company, DHL.

As Mr Prentis spoke, dozens of delegates stood and waved paper fans reading "Save our NHS".

"A Labour government is parcelling off the service, a privatisation of choice driven by dogma which was rejected by the Tories in 1995 as a privatisation too far, with Labour ministers in denial, denigrating an award-winning service as having no place in the NHS," Mr Prentis said.

But Ms Hewitt defended the decision to hive off NHS Logistics' work to the private sector on the grounds that it would present massive savings for NHS services, while conceding there were limits to the role of the private sector within public services.

"I am not going to turn my back on £1bn of savings," the health secretary told the conference.

Ms Hewitt insisted that the employment rights the workforce currently enjoyed would continue under DHL.

"There will be no two-tier workforce and staff will be transferred on comparable terms and conditions," she said, adding: "We are not making change for changes sake".

Earlier today, Ms Hewitt talked to some of the NHS Logistics workers who have taken two days of strike action in protest over the closures.

DHL provoked the ire of the GMB after it wrote to the union's general secretary, Paul Kenny, calling for one of its officers, Mick Rix, to be sacked over his comments about the company.

It emerged today that a DHL parcel depot in Hull will close with a loss of 30 jobs as part of a 3,000-strong staff reduction programme.

Labour's conference will hear tomorrow morning the outcome of a card vote on the NEC's own statement on health, which contradicts the rebel motion, although it echoes the minister's view that there should be circumscribed limits on private sector involvement on the NHS.

The Unison motion was passed on a show of hands, while Ms Dean withdrew her motion backing the government.

    Government defeated on NHS, G, 27.9.2006, http://politics.guardian.co.uk/labourconference2006/story/0,,1882316,00.html

Exclusive: Lies, loans & lordships

The cash-for-honours scandal:
Top Labour official tells 'IoS' 'Party
deliberately got round the law'

Published: 24 September 2006
The Guardian
By Marie Woolf, political editor, and Francis Elliott

Labour deliberately tried to get round the law by secretly taking loans from millionaires to boost election campaign funds, a senior party figure has claimed.

The high-ranking figure, who has given evidence to police investigating the cash-for-peerages affair, told The Independent on Sunday that the party negotiated loans rather than donations because loans would not have to be publicly declared.

His remarks, the first from inside the party, will come as a blow to Tony Blair at the beginning of the Labour Party conference in Manchester and will put fresh pressure on the Prime Minister in the cash-for-honours affair. Last week the police stepped up their investigation into whether honours were offered in return for donations and loans, and into whether Labour had flouted the law by not disclosing the loans.

The source, who operates at the highest levels in the party, said Labour negotiated the loans in the hope that many of them would be converted into donations and never repaid. "The whole process stinks," he said. The loans were "in essence, donations", he added. "What you have is secret arrangements that were designed to circumvent the law". Taking loans was "clearly fundamentally suspect" and a "deliberate attempt" to get round the law.

The police are homing in on the issue of whether the loans negotiated with the millionaires were on fully commercial terms. Labour claims they were commercial loans, and therefore could be kept secret. But loans that had favourable terms or were never going to be paid back should have been declared.

"In strict legal terms were they commercial? Yes. Were they loans? No. It was a device that was used to get around the 2000 Act," he said. He added that Labour would face a huge financial crisis if the loans were called in.

The senior figure said that he did not know for certain if Tony Blair had offered Labour lenders peerages because the funding arrangements had been kept secret from other high-ranking figures in the party, including cabinet ministers. Last night a Labour spokesman said the party "remains absolutely confident that it has done nothing wrong and acted in accordance with the law at all times".

This week the party conference will be presented with proposals to ensure that funding deals are no longer reached in secret and are not made without the agreement of the Labour Party's ruling body.

Ministers will also propose caps on party funding and an extension of state funding of political parties. The state would give funding for political parties based on how big their membership is and how many MPs they have.

Accounts published tomorrow will show that Labour is £27m in debt and all but two of the Labour lenders have agreed for the terms of their loans to be extended.

The Independent on Sunday has also learnt that two of the most prominent lenders, Barry Townsley and Sir David Garrard, will expect their money to be repaid, although they are not immediately recalling the cash.

Sir Christopher Evans, the biotech tycoon who was arrested last week, has told friends that he is angry at being implicated in the scandal. "He feels that No 10 should have known whether what they were doing was legal or not," said one confidant.

The party's auditors refused to comment on whether it had taken out loans on commercial terms. A spokesman for the auditors, Horwath, Clark, Whitehill, would not say if they had certified that the loans were fully commercial. The firm said it was "ethically bound to uphold client confidentiality".

Lord Oakeshott, a Liberal Democrat Treasury spokesman, said the wording of the auditors had been "very carefully chosen".

"The auditors' refusal to confirm the loans were on normal commercial terms speaks volumes. No banker would dream of lending unsecured deferred loans of this type at 2 per cent over base to a borrower with a net £27m hole in its balance sheet," he said.

    Exclusive: Lies, loans & lordships, IoS, 24.9.2006, http://news.independent.co.uk/uk/politics/article1726057.ece

Angry MPs demand

recall of parliament

Discontent over UK's Lebanon policy

Wednesday August 9, 2006
Guardian
Patrick Wintour,
Ewen MacAskill
and Oliver Burkeman in New York

Up to 100 MPs, most of them Labour, are to demand an immediate recall of parliament to debate the crisis in Lebanon because of growing fears about the government's strategy.

The call is expected to come in the next 48 hours and its organisers have been in discussion with the Liberal Democrat and Scottish Nationalist parties. Negotiations are also under way with campaign groups backing the call for an immediate ceasefire that attracted the support of 200 MPs.

Jon Trickett, chairman of the Compass group of 50 leftwing MPs and a force behind the appeal, said: "In this crisis, parliament needs to speak for the nation. We are living in a 24/7 society, yet our parliament seems so ossified that it goes into recess for 11 weeks and there seems no way for backbenchers to bring MPs back."

The demand will be made in a letter to Jack Straw, the leader of the Commons. The Speaker will take the decision, on the recommendation of the government.

The mood in Downing Street is that there is no great need for a recall. However, cabinet sources acknowledged that if the moves towards a UN resolution collapse, that could change.

The atmosphere at the UN was tense. Until late afternoon, diplomats appeared to be on the verge of securing a ceasefire deal, after the US and France devised concessions to an Arab League delegation that flew into New York on behalf of the Lebanese government. But at an extraordinary and emotional session of the security council, attended by representatives of Israel and Lebanon, each side aggressively reasserted a refusal to compromise.

The ambassador of Qatar, the council's only Arab member, excoriated the council for "stand[ing] idly by, crippled and unable to stop the bloodbath which has become the bitter daily lot of the unarmed Lebanese people", and warned of the "repercussions of adopting non-enforceable resolutions that will further complicate the situation on the ground."

Tarek Mitri, the Lebanese representative, flatly rejected the draft resolution's call for Israel to halt "offensive operations". He said: "All the wars launched by Israel against our country have been claimed to be self-defensive ... How could a resolution provide for a cessation of hostilities, and then in fact carry the great risk of continued violence and destruction?"

Dan Gillerman, Israel's envoy, insisted his country had no quarrel with Lebanon. But "speeches and resolutions do not in themselves end conflicts", he said. Instead, terrorism had to be "confronted and overcome".

Central to the Arab League's requests is a clause in the resolution calling for the withdrawal of Israeli forces from southern Lebanon as quickly as possible.

Progress was significantly advanced by the offer on Monday night by the Lebanese government to deploy its forces in southern Lebanon sooner than expected, to replace retreating Israeli forces and prevent further Hizbullah attacks.

Philippe Douste-Blazy, the French foreign minister, said Lebanon's pledge was an "important contribution towards solving the current crisis". The US and France, which had led the UN negotiations, welcomed the Lebanese offer and agreed to incorporate the plan into the draft.

In a further concession to the Arab League, which represents all Arab governments, they agreed to put into the draft that a proposed international force take over Sheba'a Farms, the small pocket of land Israel hung on to when it pulled out of Lebanon in 2000.

The draft resolution is becoming more complex, taking in proposals initially intended for a more detailed one in a few weeks. Denis Simonneau, the French foreign ministry spokesman, said: "We are working to have this first resolution mention a withdrawal of the Israeli army and Hizbullah." The proposed changes have delayed further the security council vote.

Hizbullah signalled that it would not resist the deployment of the Lebanese army and the Israeli prime minister, Ehud Olmert, was more ambiguous, saying the Lebanese plan was "interesting".

    Angry MPs demand recall of parliament, G, 9.8.2006, http://www.guardian.co.uk/israel/Story/0,,1840239,00.html

Anti-war challenge

Families of soldiers killed in Iraq

launch party to challenge ministers

· More than 70 candidates to contest Labour seats
· Bereaved to meet within two weeks to plan strategy

Saturday August 5, 2006
Guardian
Steve Boggan

Whenever news of British military deaths in the Middle East flashes on to their TV screen, Reg and Sally Keys become silent and you can see anxiety wash across their faces.

This week has been particularly tough; three soldiers killed in Afghanistan, one in Iraq. Each time it happens, it reminds them of their son, Thomas, one of six royal military policemen killed in Iraq in 2003.

The Keys are among 115 families whose sons have been killed in Iraq. But this week, one of the worst for British casualties, has been different for the bereaved; this week, they have been doing something about it.

Mr Keys, a 54-year-old former paramedic who stood against Tony Blair in Sedgefield at the general election, is at the centre of moves to form a new political movement aimed at bringing down ministers who failed to vote against the war in Iraq. In the next two weeks he and a small group of others will meet to lay down the foundations of Spectre, a political party that will target the people they hold culpable for the deaths of their sons in what they see as an illegal war.

Last week, four of them won an appeal court challenge against the government's refusal to hold a public inquiry into the decision to go to war against Saddam Hussein. Their lawyer, Phil Shiner, described the victory as stunning, not least because, if they are successful in November, the inquiry could see the prime minister, former foreign secretary Jack Straw and former defence secretary Geoff Hoon called to explain their actions.

The parents were delighted, but regard legal proceedings as only one element of a two-pronged attack. At Spectre's inaugural meeting, expected to be held in the Midlands, they will lay plans for a launch next month at the start of Labour's annual conference in Manchester.

The families hope to field upwards of 70 candidates at the next general election, and suck enough votes away from Labour ministers to cause political ructions.

"Every time you see news of more deaths, it just brings it all back and you realise that some family's nightmare is just beginning," Mr Keys says. "We know how those families will be feeling. We all feel we've been lied to, ignored and, frankly, insulted. But now it's different. Now we're going to make ministers pay with their seats."

Thomas Keys, 20, and five colleagues were murdered at an Iraqi police station in Al-Majar Al-Kabir. Since the deaths, Mr Keys has learned that the six were ill-equipped and could have survived if they had had such basic resources as a satellite phone to call for help.

"When they recovered Thomas's body there were 30 bullet holes in it," he says. "He had been systematically shot in the feet, shins, shoulders and arms. It was only the last two shots, to the head, that killed him. The authorities know who killed him. They even have the murderers' addresses, and the address of a man who took Thomas's watch from him, the watch I gave him for his 18th birthday. But these men are still free.

"All the parents of the soldiers killed are angry. If Thomas had been fighting for his country in a legal war, then you wouldn't be hearing from me. But we were lied to. Saddam didn't have weapons of mass destruction; he was no threat to us. So we feel those lives were lost for nothing."

Mr Keys took 4,252 votes in Sedgefield - 10.3% of the vote. Now he believes similar results up and down the country could cost Labour ministers their seats.

He will stand, as will Rose Gentle. Her 19-year-old son, Gordon, was killed in a roadside bombing in Basra in 2004. She uses a website, www.mfaw.org.uk (Military Families Against the War) to encourage bereaved families to come forward and make a stand.

"I'm getting between 200 and 300 emails a day from bereaved families, concerned military families and serving soldiers who all feel angry at the way we have been lied to," she says. "This movement is growing and by forming a political party we'll have a focus of that anger."

The idea came from John Mackenzie, the lawyer representing families of the six military policemen. He says the name Spectre was chosen to remind ministers of the fear that should haunt them. Spectre's steering committee is likely to comprise Mr Keys, Mrs Gentle and Mr Mackenzie, with Mike Aston, whose son Russell died alongside Thomas Keys, Peter Brierley, whose son Shaun died in Kuwait in 2003, Sue Smith, whose son Phillip Hewett died in a roadside bombing last year, and Beverley Clarke, who lost her son David to "friendly fire" in 2003.

Mr Brierley, who put up £11,000 of his own money to fund last week's successful court action, says: "We can do a lot of damage to the ministers who supported the war. I don't particularly have an argument with the Labour party, or even most of the government. I blame the personal ambitions of one man: Tony Blair."

Tony Travers, an elections expert at the London School of Economics, believes ministers would be unwise to ignore Spectre. "There is much evidence of a lack of trust in politicians, so when you have ordinary citizens standing, they can sometimes attract voters. Where you have bereaved citizens contesting seats, you could have an even more powerful movement."

Among those who could be vulnerable are foreign secretary Margaret Beckett, with a majority of 5,657 in Derby South; Ruth Kelly, the communities and local government secretary, with a majority of 2,064 in Bolton West; and, less conceivably, Jack Straw, leader of the Commons, whose Blackburn majority is 8,009.

John Miller's son, Simon, was one of the six military policemen killed in Al-Majar Al-Kabir. He was told this week by a senior officer in the military's special investigation branch that arrest warrants issued last January had expired and were recently renewed because no action had been taken against the men who killed his son. "He told me there was a lack of political will," Mr Miller says.

The founders of Spectre do not speak for all the bereaved families. Sandra Hyde, whose son, Lance Corporal Ben Hyde, was one of the six military policemen, said: "I don't think Ben died in vain. My husband, John, and I differ - he thinks Saddam had to be removed and war was the only way; I believe Tony Blair should have waited for a second UN resolution and more evidence of weapons of mass destruction.

"But if all those soldiers came home now with nothing being resolved, then I would feel Ben had died in vain. It all seems to be getting worse and I don't know what the answer is, but we should try to resolve the situation, if only out of respect for all those who have died."

Families of soldiers killed in Iraq launch party to challenge ministers, G, 5.8.2006, http://politics.guardian.co.uk/iraq/story/0,,1837762,00.html

Labour majority wants PM out

by autumn next year

· Disenchantment over core values revealed by poll
· Most members believe donors wield influence

Saturday June 17, 2006
Guardian
Patrick Wintour

Two-thirds of Labour's remaining members want Tony Blair to stand down by the autumn conference next year, and believe he does not trust the party sufficiently to involve members in policy making.

Half of Labour's membership also feel policy is exclusively made in Downing Street by the prime minister and his advisers. But by a majority of more than two to one, the poll gives no mandate for MPs to try to force Mr Blair out before he wishes in this parliament.

The findings, the first substantial poll of party members for a decade, are remarkable for disclosing the depths of disenchantment even among many of the party's remaining 200,000 - presumably most loyal - members. Only half the party believe the government has been mostly faithful to its fundamental values.

The levels of disillusionment from a parallel poll of lapsed members is even stronger, with 54% wanting Mr Blair to stand down this year and 23% next year. Party membership has fallen below 200,000, Labour disclosed this week.

A quarter of current party members think that rich donors have a "great deal of influence", with a further half claiming they have "some influence". Yet 62% believe individual donors should have no influence.

In a blow to Mr Blair's efforts to secure a legacy, members believe policies most associated with the chancellor, Gordon Brown - a stable economy and tax credits to help the poor - have been the most successful aspects of the Labour government. The poll also reveals members want the deputy leader, John Prescott, to stand down at the same time as Mr Blair.

The findings come in a You.Gov poll for a commission on Labour democracy chaired by Michael Meacher, which is the biggest poll of party members for a decade. Mr Meacher stressed the poll's purpose was not to oust Mr Blair, but to unearth the sense of a lack of democratic accountability inside Labour.

The findings will be presented at a conference of supporters of the Compass network today which hopes to map out a programme for an incoming Brown administration, including an accent on progressive tax, such as a land tax.

The conference will also hear a call from Ed Balls, the Treasury minister, to expose the "emptiness" of David Cameron.

Nearly a quarter of current party members disclose they were close or "quite close" to quitting the party because of the invasion of Iraq, but 60% say they were not at all close. Asked to name the party's six worst mistakes, Iraq comes top, cited by 52%. Subservience to the US comes second (49%), relying on privatisation in the public services (46%) comes third, and refusing to raise the top rate of income tax (36%) comes fourth.

Only 15% of party members cite removing Saddam Hussein as the one of the most six successful aspects of the government.

The four most important achievements cited are economic stability (78%), help for the poor (77%), reducing hospital waiting times (50%) and improving standards of education (43%).

In what amounts to a challenge for the new party chairman, Hazel Blears, 74% of party members claim ordinary members do not have much, or any, influence on government policy, while 75% believe wealthy donors have great or some influence.

The findings suggest that attempts to involve members through policy forums have little credibility, and Mr Brown will have to undertake some bold acts of governance to convince the membership it has a role in the modern party.

There is also a degree of scepticism about widening Labour support through a largely web-based supporters' network: 51% of members believe a registered supporters' network is a good way of drawing people into the party, but 32% think it may undermine the point of full membership.

You.Gov polled through an internet panel 670 current party members and 704 lapsed members between June 1 and 6.

The findings

· When should Tony Blair stand down?

Before the 2006 party conference this autumn - 37%; before the 2007 party conference - 34%; before the 2008 party conference - 11%

· Which is your preference?

Mr Blair should choose when to stand down - 66%; Labour MPs should insist on a contest - 27%

· Should the party's programme be put to the members?

Party's election programme should be put to a ballot of members - 55%; no need to go the trouble and expense - 38%

    Labour majority wants PM out by autumn next year, G, 17.6.2006, http://politics.guardian.co.uk/polls/story/0,,1799789,00.html