Britain's Blair to urge members to focus on reforms

MANCHESTER, England, Sep 26 (Reuters) British Prime Minister Tony Blair, determined to pull his Labour Party out of an unseemly leadership battle, is expected to urge members today to focus on reforms in order to win the next election.

He will tell the party at its annual conference it must stick to the modernising reform agenda he shaped during nearly a decade in office and broaden Labour's appeal.

''The core vote of this party is not the heartlands, the inner city or any sectional interest or lobby. Our core vote is the country,'' Blair will say in his final speech to the conference, according to extracts released by aides.

But his attempts to unify the party at the rally in northern England looked in trouble before he even began speaking after a new row erupted in a long-running succession battle between Blair and his finance minister and heir apparent Gordon Brown.

Blair was forced to say this month to say he would resign within a year, ceding to pressure to step aside to make way for Brown to take over as prime minister.

Today the media seized on reported criticism of Brown by Blair's wife. Cherie Blair, according to a report on news agency Bloomberg, accused Brown of lying when he told the conference yesterday that it had been a privilege to work for Blair. She has denied making the remark.

FISSURE Peter Mandelson, a close confidant of Blair and now European trade commissioner, said a real effort was under way to repair a fissure between the Blair and Brown camps that he said dated back to Blair winning the party leadership in 1994.

''Gordon (Brown) thought he could and should have been leader in 1994 and he has never fully reconciled himself to not doing so,'' he told BBC radio.

Mandelson praised Brown as ''a winner'', adding: ''I want the next leader to be as successful as the last and were it to be Gordon Brown I think he would be.'' Reuters AB VV1543