LONDON (AFP) — Embattled premier Gordon Brown won praise Wednesday for a key speech to his Labour Party, but the positive headlines were quickly clouded by the surprise resignation of a top minister.
Brown's make-or-break address to Labour's annual conference in Manchester, Tuesday bought him time as he battles a rebellion among MPs worried they face defeat at the next general election, experts said.
But just hours after the speech on the event's final day, it emerged that Transport Secretary Ruth Kelly will leave the government at the next Cabinet reshuffle, which reports suggest could come as early as next week.
The news swiftly reignited questions about Brown's leadership which have been festering for months and came to a head earlier this month when four lawmakers left their junior government jobs in protest.
In total, a dozen Labour members of parliament have called for a leadership contest.
Kelly and Brown insisted she was quitting to spend more time with her young family -- the 40-year-old has four children aged between five and 11.
Addressing the conference soon after confirming she would quit, Kelly received warm applause from Brown and a standing ovation from delegates.
"I ask your understanding when I say that I now owe it to my children and family to put them first. If I do not, then I know that this is something I will come to regret deeply later," she said.
Earlier, she had denied the move was linked to the rebellion and hailed Brown as "a towering figure in the Labour Party". The premier said he understood her decision.
Some reports suggested that Kelly had quit her job before being dropped from the Cabinet by Brown in the reshuffle, although Brown said they had discussed the move as early as May.
The news switched attention from Brown's unusually personal keynote conference speech Tuesday in which he argued that he was a serious politician for serious times, namely the global economic turmoil.
"This is no time for a novice," he told delegates, in an apparent reference to the youthful leader of the main opposition Conservatives David Cameron and his own Foreign Secretary David Miliband, favourite to take over if he quits.
"Mr Brown has won important breathing space. How long it will last no one knows," the Times newspaper said in an editorial, while the Daily Mail tabloid said the "defiant" speech would silence his critics.
Wyn Grant, politics professor at Warwick University, said Brown would now be safe until the European elections next June.
"I think it was a turning point in terms of his standing in the Labour Party, whether it is in poll ratings I'm more doubtful," he told AFP, noting there were few firm policy pledges in the speech due to a shortage of cash.
Labour's deputy leader Harriet Harman used the conference's closing address to say the "fightback has begun".
"People said this conference would be a scene of division and disunity but you have proved them wrong," she told delegates.
Brown heads for the United Nations in New York Wednesday for the annual UN General Assembly, where he will discuss reform of the international finance system with fellow world leaders.
Lawmakers return to parliament after their summer break on October 6, when rebels could start plotting afresh.
Then comes a by-election in Glenrothes, likely soon after the US presidential elections in November, where the pro-independence Scottish National Party could beat Labour.
And in the middle of next year, Labour faces a tough fight to secure a respectable showing in European and local council elections.
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