Glenys Kinnock MEP: Civil liberties

"That is what we will be concentrating on doing in the next three months."

He argued that the Swansea East result puts Labour on course to win a majority in the Assembly elections in 2003.

The new AM was given a rapturous welcome by the gathering.

Ms Lloyd took the seat in the first by-election of the new assembly, caused by the death of Labour's Val Feld earlier this summer.

However, turnout for the poll was only 22%, with commentators blaming the bad weather and the effect of the international crisis prompted by the US terrorist attacks.

Mr Murphy also warned that public services must be reformed to take advantage of increased spending.

International events look set to dominate the truncated conference with Welsh delegates uneasy about the government's support for the American response to the terror attacks.

Meanwhile, Welsh Labour MEP, Glenys Kinnock, has warned that new anti-terrorism measures could risk demonising and criminalising Muslims.

She told the BBC that the government's proposals for schemes such as identity cards should maintain civil liberties and human rights.

Humanitarian crisis

"We risk having people picked up simply because of their ethnic background, their nationality, the way they look, where they came from, that's very dangerous and I think could be very divisive."

She said many Labour Party members would feel enormous pain if innocent civilians were affected by any American response.

"I think what we've seen and what maybe we continue to see is, is a whole failure of the diplomatic process to deal with this crisis."

"Our party would be deeply worried about the humanitarian crisis that is occurring and is likely to get worse, were there to be a big military conflict in the region."

Mrs Kinnock said she thought the prime minister had handled the crisis well.