By Stuart Ramsay, Political Editor (that sounds so good!)
Much as the title sounds boring, the Labour Party are of course the current ruling party, and are probably one of the largest sources of press speculation at the moment, mainly because their of conference in Manchester (which finished two days ago). Let's look at what's speculation, and what's fact:
1) Tony Blair will be going before Christmas. This is speculation, he will be going before the next party conference, so there will be a new Labour leader before this time next year. Although, it is possible that Blair will be forced to stand down before then: let's face it, it is difficult to retain control over a party when you've said far in advance that you will leave. It's arguably easier if you said you were leaving just one day, and let the party have an open election as soon as possible.
2) Gordon Brown will be the next Prime Minister. More speculation. The party has to have a leadership election the same as the Tories did to get from Howard to Cameron, and the Lib Dems to get from Kennedy to Campbell. However, if nobody stands against Gordon Brown, he will be the next Prime Minister. This, again, however, is unlikely: the the party is searching for an "ABG" candidate, "Anyone but Gordon", and the contenders are suggested as John Reid (current home secretary) and Alan Milburn (current education secretary, who recently announced the scrapping of GCSE Mathematics coursework, much to the delight of the NUT) Correction: Alan Johnson is education secretary
3) Cherie Blair called Gordon Brown a liar. Probably the most speculated-over statement. Cherie Blair denies the allegations, but the original journalist, who works for Bloomberg, a respected press agency, refuses to retract. It is possibly understandable that Cherie Blair might consider the relationship between Tony and Gordon as one that either of them would describe as a privilege, but who knows what goes on in No 10. Tony diffused the scandal by joking in his speech, "at least I don't have to worry about her running off with the bloke next door".
4) Tony Blair's speech left the party in amazement. Probably true for most of the party; many members considered his speech was passionate, professional and well-delivered. Indeed, some wondered why he had to leave. Then they remembered everything else that had happened :-P (sorry, I couldn't resist)
5) Tony Blair has a list of 30 policies he wants to enact before he leaves. Speculation, but it was revealed by a senior civil servant. On one hand, it makes his remaining time in office more focussed, but it might be unrealistic or considered a final pathetic act to get some policies through, although knowing much of it could be changed back as soon as he was out of office.
The Labour party is waiting now for Tony to step down; and the mounting tension to find somebody to stand against Gordon Brown is possibly overshadowing the business of policy-making. Nobody can quite be sure how it will end up.
I believe stamp duty was already introduced, he just lowered the boundaries so that more people got caught.
Inheritance tax is my particular bugbear...you get to keep £250,000 then the rest of the estate gets taxed at 40%. However, you aren't able to access ANY of the estate until inheritance tax is paid off, requiring you to take out a loan and meaning you can't take your £250,00 free and leave.
conservitives will scrap inheritance! VOTE TORY!
I think you mean inheritance tax Swilly. Removing inheritance is not generally a good thing.