DAILYPOSTYOUR VOICE IN WALES: Why should Blair decide who gets to be PM?

THERE is now a "new understanding", we are told, between Messrs Blair and Brown, that will lead to the chancellor moving into No. 10 in around two years or so, when the present incumbent decides he's had enough.

Ex-minister David Blunkett revealed as much yesterday when he signalled that the two men had reached an agreement on the handover of power - without revealing exactly when it would happen.

Even if he knows when the transition might take place, it would be doing neither Labour nor Mr Blair any favours at all to put the date in the public domain. Limiting Mr Blair's tenure to a specific date would instantly transform him into a "lame duck" leader - as if he did not already have sufficient problems to contend with.

As to the succession issue, there must surely be a significant number of Labour MPs irritated by the imminent prospect of Mr Brown being "anointed" as the next leader by the current prime minister.

Issues such as education reforms, ID cards, and the war in Iraq have been haunting Labour thinking for so long now that many MPs must believe the time is right to show the current leadership they are fed up with the way the party is heading.

They have given Mr Blair a fright or two in recent years, and may yet provide one or two more edge-of-the-seat moments before his time is up. Many MPs may feel a smooth succession is in the party's electoral interests, but there may well be an equal number eager not to miss the opportunity of a change at the top to bloody the leadership's nose a little.

There is something slightly arrogant about the two next-door neighbours from Downing Street believing they can stitch up the handover in their own terms. A leadership election, designed to demonstrate that the Labour Party is still a collection of individual thinkers, might not go amiss in the circumstances.