Minister: Labour must 'keep its nerve'

A government minister has called on Labour to "keep its nerve" in the face of a series of poor poll results and damaging headlines.

From the runon the Northern Rock bank and revelations about illegalpayments made to Labour and government agencies mislaying millionsof people's data, Gordon Brown's honeymoon is now a distantmemory.

But in aninterview with ePolitix.com, justice minister Maria Eagle said theway forward was to highlight Conservative "tittle-tattle" whilstconcentrating on the real work.

"We have tocarry on governing, meet the promises we have made and show we cando a good job.

"A lot of thetravails that are supposedly besetting the Labour government arecertainly not the things people raise with me when I am out andabout in . I haven't had a stream of angry people raising the sortof things you read in the papers."

Following theelection that Brown pulled out of calling in autumn, Eagle saysthere is now time to re-establish credibility.

"There isgoing to be some time between now and the next election and we haveto make sure that we are focused on delivering our promises," shesaid.

"We also haveto highlight the fact that when it comes down to it theConservatives talk mainly about tittle-tattle, there is nopolicy.

"When it comesdown to it people in this country when they come to vote are goingto be thinking about economics, about who is going to make thembetter off, who will make sure they are still in a job and willmake sure the schools and hospitals are good and at the momentthere is only one answer to those questions and that is Labour.

"So this yearwe have to keep our nerve, have confidence that we can go ondealing with the real issues and the events that can hit anygovernment and get on with the job and I think we can do that."