GORDON Brown has issued a desperate plea to his MPs to stop plotting against him and concentrate on Labour unity and defeating the Conservatives.As the party's annual conference gets under way in Manchester, he called for Labour's full focus to be on “this turbulent economic time” and a restatement of the case “for our party and values” rather than indulging in intrigue.

Graham Dines

GORDON Brown has issued a desperate plea to his MPs to stop plotting against him and concentrate on Labour unity and defeating the Conservatives.

As the party's annual conference gets under way in Manchester, he called for Labour's full focus to be on “this turbulent economic time” and a restatement of the case “for our party and values” rather than indulging in intrigue.

The Prime Minister said conference should concentrate on communicating the message that the choice at the next election would be between the Tories who only wanted to help the few and not the many, and the Labour pledge of fairness and opportunity for all.

Mr Brown's hope that the party will rally behind him and give him time to try to claw back the massive poll lead being built up by David Cameron and the Conservatives was nearly derailed before arriving at the Manchester conference centre, which is the former central station which was the terminus for the old main line route linking Manchester with Buxton, Derby and London St Pancras.

A poll in today's Independent newspaper revealed that the majority of Labour members and supporters wanted a new leader. More than half of respondents said there should be a vote at conference on whether Mr Brown should face a leadership election and 45% believed that changing the leader before the next election would improve Labour's prospects.