That isn’t happening any more,” said one official.Mr Hain is said to be keen to investigate the use the Kerry campaign has made of the internet as well as reporting back on techniques employed by the Bush campaign that are likely to be aped by the Tories.The cabinet minister will stop short of publicly endorsing Mr Kerry’s attempt to depose Mr Bush, however.Mr Blair has plenty of work to do in restoring good relations with the Democrats after his steadfast support for Mr Bush.The Prime Minister, who has never met Mr Kerry, is far behind Gordon Brown when it comes to personal relations with the alternative president.Mr Brown is understood to have been keeping tabs on the Kerry campaign through his speech-writer and friend Bob Shrum. Tony Blair has secretly opened negotiations with John Kerry in an attempt to repair his damaged relations with the US Democratic presidential candidate. The local elections may have been dominated by the fringe parties but Mr Howard faces a much more formidable foe when it comes to the general election.The Tory leader is reluctant to speculate on what would happen if Gordon Brown, not Tony Blair, led Labour into the next national poll, but he insists that he is prepared for that possibility.”We will be ready for that … Brown is not some sort of new figure who has just arrived on the scene He’s been Chancellor for seven years.

He is responsible for 66 tax rises; he is responsible for the extra burden of regulation and he’s been responsible for many of the Government’s failures to reform – so I am not dismayed of having those arguments.”Mr Howard likes to taunt the Prime Minister with questions about how long he intends to cling to Number 10. But can he give an assurance that he will fight the general election after next as the Tory leader?”If I win. But where there are no local issues on which to campaign, it seems traditional Tory support is flirting with outright withdrawal from the EU.His aides say that they detect a strong regional element to UKIP’s support. To serve a full term, yes.” And if not? “Then there are a huge range of possibilities and we will have to wait to see what happens.”. They say the further north the campaign bus travels, it peters out in favour of the BNP. (The would-be heckler is foiled by an enterprising aide who engages him in earnest debate about the merits of withdrawal, which keeps him from his megaphone during an impromptu speech by the Conservative leader.)Back on board his campaign bus, complete with the slogan “Putting Britain first”, a regional agent is overheard telling the Tory leader that UKIP is proving a problem in those areas without council elections.

However, Mr Hoon faces a High Court hearing, in July, into demands by human rights lawyers and civil rights campaigners for a full independent inquiry into British forces’ behaviour in Iraq.This development follows the admission by Adam Ingram, the Armed Forces minister, disclosed by the IoS last week, that the MoD is investigating 10 cases of Iraqisdying through alleged mistreatment by British troops – a greater number than previously acknowledged.The cases now being reviewed after Amnesty’s intervention include that of Ahmad Jabbar Kareem, a teenager who drowned after allegedly being forced to swim in a river following a severe beating by British troops. Because John Major and Ken Clarke are out of the country a lot it has been very hard to fix it, but we are trying to fix it up,” he said.To be fair, Mr Howard hardly has time on his hands himself at the moment, criss-crossing the country by bus and helicopter On the stump, he is an impressive campaigner. On his walkabouts he is energetic and charming.His silk-lined suit jacket stays on the bus and he takes to the streets in shirtsleeves, bouncing from one side of a shopping mall to the other, relentlessly pumping hands.The ponderous Duncan Smith and wispy Hague did not do this so well despite far more supporting flummery.He says he enjoys it and the reaction from voters, if warm, does seem to buoy him up. It would be much the best thing if the Government says soon that it’s not going to institute the September [tax] rise.”Raise the possibility that his intervention might be seen as a shade, well opportunist, and it lights the blue touch paper.Once he has shredded Mr Blair, the Tory leader adds: “If I don’t talk about things like that, I am not doing my job properly.”Forced on the defensive by the surprise surge in support for UKIP, Mr Howard denies that he is feeling the heat “I don’t feel any pressure at all The elections are a test, I accept that.

But UKIP, is it a test? I don’t think I do [accept that].The Tory leader dismisses as “complete nonsense from beginning to end” the claim that he is reaping a eurosceptic whirlwind he stirred up. He says that his party is no different from Labour in having within its ranks people with widely differing views on the European Union.The Tory leader last spoke to Ken Clarke “about three weeks ago,” he says. He admits, however, that the “advisory council” of Mr Clarke, Iain Duncan Smith, William Hague and John Major, set up as part of an effort to draw a line under the divisions of the past, has met just once.”We’ve had one dinner and we have been trying very hard to arrange another one. Speaking to The Independent on Sunday, Mr Howard seems keen to tone down his support for fuel protesters saying, for instance, that he can’t envisage supporting a new blockade of oil refineries.”I doubt that [a blockade] would be [lawful] I don’t support anything that isn’t lawful or peaceful. “This is the most opportunist party there has been in modern British politics.” Michael Howard pauses, more to check his rising ire than to formulate the next sentence. “Tony Blair supported Michael Foot, joined CND to progress in the Labour Party, did over his best friend to lead the Labour Party.