The Blair government is currently basking in favourable media coverage and enjoying an easy ride from a party and movement still frozen by new realism and stunned by the scale of their electoral success and the sheer relief of being rid of the Tories. In the current climate, criticism is often unwelcome. Understandably, Labour supporters want to believe the best of the leaders they have only recently elected. They want to believe that things are getting better. But the inescapable truth is that things will most certainly not get better if the Government continues on its present course.
Of course, there have been a number of positive and popular initiatives, including the bans on handguns and anti-personnel landmines, Chris Smith's assault on the Camelot fat cats (pity he had to back down in the end) and Tony Banks' attack on tobacco sponsorship of sports events. But on balance these moves, many of them primarily symbolic, do not outweigh the concerns raised by the review of NHS funding, with its threat of new charges for GP visits, pensioners' prescriptions, and non-medical hospital costs; the talk of privatisation of London Underground; the threat to deport 50,000 "illegal immigrants"; or disquieting noises about single mothers.
The core character of the Blair government was revealed in its recent "triumph" in Amsterdam. What did the "new approach" to Europe amount to? Thanks to Blair and Cook British borders are now sacrosanct in perpetuity and Europe's defence eternally tied to NATO. What precisely is new, or desirable, about this combination of island chauvinism and old fashioned Atlanticist subordination to the United States?
Worse yet, these knee-jerk reactionary preferences were combined with a ruthless insistence on maintaining the tight fiscal and monetary targets for the creation and subsequent policing of the single currency. It was not Helmut Kohl but Tony Blair who insisted that the new commitment to "putting employment top of Europe's agenda" would be unfunded. Blair, Brown and Cook left the French socialists isolated. In so doing, they spurned a historic opportunity: the chance to build a new social democratic block in Europe capable of challenging neo-liberal dominance. There can be little doubt now that Blair and Brown intend to push on to the single currency, softening up the electorate with nationalistic rhetoric and gestures.
At the Heads of Government meeting in Amsterdam, as at the European socialists conclave at Malmo, Blair's message was sternly Thatcherite: "labour flexibility" - not full employment or a renewed welfare state or rights in the workplace or environmental sustainability - is the gospel the new Government seems determined to promulgate at home and abroad. Depending on their audience, Blair and Brown interpret the gospel as a new emphasis on training and skills. However, in a job market where the balance of supply and demand remains overwhelmingly favourable to employers, and in the absence of new resources for education (not to mention the desperate measures now required to salvage the FE sector), this emphasis will remain purely rhetorical. At the core of "labour flexibility" are "competitive" (i.e., low) labour costs, and this means poverty pay, weak trade unions, insecurity of employment and management tyranny in the workplace.
The necessary complement to "labour flexibility" and one of the key means of achieving it is what Blair and his allies dub "welfare reform". This was the other virtue preached by Blair to his European counterparts. Increasingly it is becoming obvious that this means dragooning the poor into the workforce on terms dictated by the employers. Frank Field likes to claim the moral high ground for his attacks on "idleness and dishonesty", but the reality is that "welfare reform" in this context is a cost-cutting exercise, driven by fiscal conservatism. It is a strategy for keeping down government spending while at the same time increasing the "competitiveness" of the workforce. Reporting from Amsterdam, the BBC's Robin Oakley told viewers it was just like Mrs Thatcher's day. No wonder.
Across Europe, people are rejecting neo-liberalism in favour of moves towards full employment and strong social welfare. Britain is not and will not be an exception to that trend. As Labour voters find that their aspirations are incompatible with the core economic policies of the Government, they will look for explanations for - and alternatives to - their disillusionment.
Much will then depend on the confidence of the left. Will Socialist Campaign Group MPs - in alliance with other sections of the PLP - lead the parliamentary fight against New Thatcherism? Will left Labour Party members join with activists outside the Party to fight for social and environmental justice? Will socialist activists force trade union leaders to use their authority in the interests of the working class? Whether the Labour Government can be won back on course to meet the aspirations of its supporters depends not on which of the above groups acts in isolation but on whether, for once, we can work together - and force our new Government to listen and learn before it's too late.