One part of the new Labour psyche has been consistently misdiagnosed. Far from suffering from an overdose of self-belief, Tony Blair's lieutenants have shown all the signs of lack of confidence. Even in September 1997, at the height of the government's honeymoon, senior officials warned darkly of the challenges posed by the vigorous new Conservative leader. And that was after William Hague donned his base- ball cap. True, ministers did not quake in their boots at the prospect of Iain Duncan Smith, but when Michael Howard - yes, even he - pledged on his inauguration to modernise the Tories, Labour suffered another bout of the heebie-jeebies.

The election of David Cameron has, therefore, produced the most severe case yet of Labour gloom. Here is a man who is youthful, televisual and modern. Here is a leader who vows to take on the vested interests that have been holding his party back in its quest for power. Here is a man who has media magnates kneeling at his feet. Tony Blair, 1997, refashioned. How could any floating voter resist such seduction?

Labour is right, this time, to take the challenge seriously, to think long and hard about the best way to deal with it in the months and years ahead. But the most timid conclusions would also be the wrong ones.

From the moment Blair walked into Downing Street he saw himself and his party as squatters, not as owners or even tenants of the building. The strategy that has suffused his every decision, triangulation - differentiating his new Labour brand as much against his own party's traditions as the Tories' - stems from the Prime Minister's belief in the essentially conservative nature of the British people. His investment in the public services has been a race against time, fearing that voters would inevitably tire of paying taxes to fund schools and hospitals. His acquiescence to nuclear defence and his unqualified support for the United States are based on a belief that a Labour government runs foreign affairs under licence. Similarly, his trimming on Europe and his disdain for civil libertarians hinge on an acceptance of majority public opinion rather than any attempt to change it.

Given that political movements are at their most persuasive in their early years, is there anything the Labour government can do to detach the halo that most of the media have affixed to Cameron's head? What they should not do, and correctly seem reluctant to do, is go for him personally. Toff he may be; career based entirely in politics and public relations it may be, but voters, it seems, have moved on from easy labels. His past political views and future political strategy provide the only avenues for attack, but these are likely to be fertile.

The man who has wafted into prominence without a meaningful policy to his name - at least Blair had identified a few by 1994 - will have to go beyond the platitudes about "compassionate Conservatism" that he culled from across the Atlantic. He will have to demonstrate his apparent commitment to public services; he will have to, as Blair pointed out during Prime Minister's Questions, do more than talk a good talk on climate change and social justice (although on green issues, at least, Blair seems to have given up even talking the talk). Cameron will have to, just as ministers will in the tighter economic climate of coming years, show where he will tax, spend - or cut.

Gordon Brown understands this and for this reason he is more sanguine than those of a more nervous disposition wish him to be. They wince at the unfavourable comparisons of his pre-Budget report with the elegant Cameron coronation that followed. They point out the golden rule of politics (not the economic one the Chancellor has taken to doctoring): that cycles are immutable, and that this Labour administration might be at the wrong end of one. Brown might respond that, for all the recent wobbles, the UK economy remains doggedly stable and voters know it.

The task for Labour between now and the next election is to find a language and set of policies for the post-Blair era. The advent of a more competent Conservative opponent can only be helpful, not just for easy political juxtaposition, but to revive faith in a decrepit democratic process that has damaged Blair as much as anyone else. Brown does not have the merits of youth, but he still has more to offer if he delivers a rejuvenated Labour that is coherent, clean - and courageous.

Who's afraid of the big good lion?

A far more titanic contest than anything Westminster has to offer is the enduring spat between Polly Toynbee and the Daily Mail. No sooner had the doyenne of the Guardian commentariat fulminated against the neo-con, Christian-right, corporate conspiracy that is The Chronicles of Narnia than Her Majesty's Disloyal Opposition inveighed against her and the dark forces of secularism. For once, Disney has not had to alter the message to fit political requirements.

In the world of C S Lewis redemption is found in the lion's ultimate sacrifice. Aslan has always worn his ideology on his mane. But are we bothered? The earth may reverberate to the sound of Bibles being bashed across the United States, but in the UK our children are made of sterner stuff. It will take more than one exposure to a feline tale on celluloid to prise them away from the joys of consumerism.

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