Blair wants to fight for Labour leadership

Tony Blair, runaway favourite to head the Labour Party, is eager for a leadership contest that will help him to define the ideological stamp he intends to put on the party and to avoid accusations that members were not given a choice.

That became clear as Labour's poll rating soared to a remarkable

54 points and Mr Blair let it be known to close colleagues that he was determined to build a team 'of all the talents', in which senior figures of differing views could be assured key Shadow Cabinet jobs.

Mr Blair's private but strongly expressed wish to avoid any suggestion of an uncontested 'anointment' means few if any MPs and union leaders are likely to follow the example of Bill Jordan, president of the Engineering and Electrical Union, in urging contenders to stand down.

Instead, John Prescott, shadow Employment Secretary, looks increasingly likely to emerge as Mr Blair's opponent in a contest which will, in effect, begin immediately after next Thursday's European elections.

Although Labour was treating today's Gallup poll in the Daily Telegraph with caution, the figures give the future leader a boost by showing his party with a 33-point lead over the Tories, in third place with 21 per cent. The Liberal Democrats have 21.5 per cent.

The main imponderable in the leadership contest is Margaret Beckett, the deputy leader. If she stands it would remove any inhibitions from those contemplating a challenge for the deputy leadership. Mr Prescott could be tempted to stand himself.

Mr Blair's intention to maintain the unity left by John Smith means leading figures on the centre left, such as Robin Cook and Mr Prescott, can expect important roles irrespective of the outcome of a leadership contest. Friends of Mr Blair were anxious to emphasise last night that he had no intention of mounting a 'takeover' by the party's modernising faction.

Mr Blair's wish not to emerge as Labour's uncontested leader was underpinned by Ken Livingstone, the left-wing MP for Brent East, who said the idea of a 'coronation' was repugnant.

Mr Livingstone said that Mr Blair would be 'the most extreme right-wing leader' the Labour Party had ever had. Urging Margaret Beckett to stand, he told BBC radio: 'I value our link with the unions.'

David Blunkett, the party chairman, underlined his desire for a contest but also appealed for the issue to be put aside until 10 June.

Mr Blair last night mounted a scathing attack on 'look after yourself' Tory philosophy in his first speech since being given a clear run to capture the Labour leadership by Gordon Brown, the shadow Chancellor, who said on Wednesday that he would not enter the contest.

Attacking not only the Conservatives' 'deception' and policies but their entire philosophy, the shadow Home Secretary pledged to replace 15 years of Tory failure with Labour policies of 'change and renewal'.

Developing the 'rebuilding society' theme highlighted in a speech last week, Mr Blair told a Labour rally for the by-election in Eastleigh, Hampshire, that the Tories had created a Britain 'weakened by recession, corroded by crime, scarred by urban squalor. The evidence of social disintegration lies all around us.'

He said Tory tax increases were not the price of future success but the price of past failure - a comment almost identical to statements by Mr Brown and the first of many expected signs of the two working in close co-operation.

Mr Blair emphasised last night that rebuilding society after 15 years of Tory failure was not just a battle of policy. It was not just the policies which had failed: 'It is Tory philosophy, Tory values.'

Leading article, page 17