By Nick Assinder BBC News Online political correspondent

There has even been talk of a leadership challenge

Over the next few days in Bournemouth we may well get the answer to that question.

There are plenty of issues to engage the annual party conference, but they will all pale into insignificance against the one big issue - Tony Blair.

Never before in his leadership has he appeared to need the support of the party as he does now, at this annual conference.

Party activists have always believed he needs them, of course. Certainly for money and their votes but also for their wider political support and, crucially at election time, their grassroots machinery.

Indeed, may of them view a Labour leader as their creature, if not servant.

To what extent Tony Blair realises this, accepts this or even cares is what remains to be seen.

Unthinkable?

There are even rumblings about disgruntled party activists planning to demand a leadership election at the conference.

It is certainly the case that Brent brought together many of the strains currently tearing at the centre of government and the wider Labour party and which are turning voters away

Only a few weeks ago that would have been virtually unthinkable. Now it is more a case of whether the leadership can head it off.

It almost certainly can. And in any case, it is still pretty certain that the prime minister would win it. Probably.

But the rebels - who are seizing on Labour�s disastrous Brent East by-election as the reason for their planned coup - have a point.

And it is one that is beginning to be debated more seriously, if secretively, than at any previous time.

And it will undoubtedly be the big topic of conversation in the bars and restaurants in Bournemouth and on the fringe of the conference.

Strains

It is whether the leader who took them to two landslide election victories and has now broken Attlee's record by securing the longest serving Labour government in history is now an electoral liability.

It is certainly the case that Brent brought together many of the strains currently tearing at the centre of government and the wider Labour party and which are turning voters away.

The war on Iraq and its consequences, the Hutton inquiry, the perceived lack of delivery and the overall loss of trust combined to deliver the prime minister what many see as a wakeup call. Cold showers don�t come any colder.

And the conference will see debates, even old-fashioned rows, on a whole range of contentious issues including Iraq, foundation hospitals, tuition fees, pensions, council tax and petrol prices.

There are very likely going to be some defeats for the government. How the prime minister responds to those in his big speech will be crucial.

Fate

Last year he told his party that he was set on a particular modernising course and delivered a blunt, like it or lump it challenge.

Some in the Labour movement believe that, whatever the prime minister may have thought in the past, he is no longer in any doubt about the extent to which he now needs the party

He appeared, as he often does, to be talking over the heads of his party to the country which elected him.

His speech left the overwhelming impression of a man who felt his fate lay entirely in the hands of the wider electorate, and only minimally with the Labour party.

Those who wanted to follow him were welcome as partners - albeit junior ones - but those opposed to him would be left behind.

If that was indeed his policy, it is about to be tested in Bournemouth.

Olive branches?

Some in the Labour movement believe that, whatever the prime minister may have thought in the past, he is no longer in any doubt about the extent to which he now needs the party.

If they give him the bum�s rush this week his fortunes could take an even darker turn.

And that has led to the conclusion amongst some that, whatever the platform rhetoric, the prime minister will use this year�s conference to offer some olive branches to his rebellious troops.

That has its own dangers. The Tories will be looking for just that so they can claim that the unions and the activists are back in charge of the party.

And any softening on foundation hospitals, for example, could result in yet more demands on the Exchequer.