LONDON: For the first time in more than 10 years, there is at least the possibility that the Conservatives will win the next election. The prospect is still happily remote. But it is no longer inconceivable.
The cause of the sea change has been luridly illustrated by the Tories' cynical success in pushing immigration back to the top of the public agenda. The Blair revolution is over. Politics is back to normal. The Tories' chance of victory hangs on their hope that the prime minister is unable or unwilling to accept that the change is permanent.
New Labour was created in his image and he has never been reluctant to portray himself as the embodiment of its virtues. I have lost count of the number of times at which he asked the nation to accept his good faith and integrity. And he has sought to stand for more than trust.
Whether or not he does (or ever did) personify courage, competence and moderation is no longer important. In 1997, Tony Blair could have reduced fears about immigration with a wide-eyed television broadcast. Now, an intervention by the prime minister would only increase the apprehensions.
Office was always certain to tarnish the gloss and glamour of opposition. And, as he must know, the war in Iraq - and the way in which it was justified - has done irrevocable damage to the clean, young image.
But there is no reason why Tony Blair's diminished status should be Michael Howard's passport to Downing Street. All the prime minister has to do for a third victory to be assured is govern sensibly for another year.
For the whole life of his two governments, the Tory party had barely laid a glove on Tony Blair. The wounds - including the still-haemorrhaging immigration fiasco - have been self- inflicted.
All of them have had as their basic cause an attempt to replace the processes of reliable government - party, parliament and cabinet - with the hegemony of the prime minister and the unelected advisers who make up his court.
In the back rooms of Downing Street, they are still arguing that the prime minister's years of supremacy are not dead beyond recall. They are telling him that he can restore his reputation - an guarantee another landslide - by behaving as he behaved during his first administration.
The technique they recommend involves forcing the Labour party to accept more policies that it finds distasteful. Tony Blair thus proves his strength and valour by slaying the dreaded dragon - socialism.
Some advisers even claim that now is an ideal time to impose more of "the project" on the Labour party. The prime minister escaped humiliation in the university top-up fee vote because so many of the scheme's opponents feared the damage that defeat would do the government.
Neither the prime minister nor those who surround him possess a firm political ideology. They will take it for granted that, on the backbenches, pragmatism will continue to triumph over principal until polling day.
We may, therefore, be facing a unique period in Labour history - the run-up to an election in which the leadership is more reckless about party unity than the led. Austin Mitchell has described the prime minister's attitude to policy-making as jumping off a cliff and crying "catch me before I hit the ground".
Tony Blair is probably right to assume that, no matter how often he performs the trick between now and next May, he will be saved from self-destruction. But the spectacle will be deeply damaging to the government's prospects. The day when he could alter the course of history has passed. He will look like a worried Icarus with broken wings.
If the prime minister persists in imposing what passes for his philosophy on a reluctant party, rebellion is certain - not least because the rejection of the third way (or whatever it is currently called) would be so reasonable a revolution.
The great policy shift towards competition, choice and the market is rejected by most of the party that Tony Blair leads. There is a long list of government policies that a democratic Labour conference would have defeated and the parliamentary party would have preferred not to support.
A combination of self-respect and the rediscovery of loyalty to an idea, rather than to an individual, has created a new climate. Blind adherence to Blairism is out in the cold.
No doubt, over the next few months, we will hear a series of speeches about not turning back, the courage to do what is right and the need to take tough decisions. Fine.
But the country wants and the party needs a period of steady, unspectacular, competent government - with its real achievements not obscured by unnecessary conflict. The Labour movement is sensible enough to hope for unity in the run-up to the general election.
But unity is not the same as subservience. Let us hope that the prime minister's hubris does not reduce his chances of beating Michael Howard. -Dawn/The Guardian News Service.
