Dear Mr Brown...

Well with Tony gone, everyone suddenly wants Gordon Brown to do them a favour. The papers and magazines last week were full of full page adverts from pressure groups asking him to fulfil promises or make a bold policy break in a different direction.

It seems at first as if they were placed too. Gordon is keen to put as much ground between himself and Tony as possible, so is open to policies through which he might do so. That means he's listening to public opinion and may quite likely be swayed into things while he's still fresh in the job.

He's made some encouraging noises already. Keen to exit the shadow of Iraq, there has been talk of withdrawl soon. Keen to appear less authoritarian, the language has changed with regards to the 'law on terror' and Islam following the recent bungled attacks. Keen to appear less controlling and make a clean break from 'sofa politics', on Tuesday Brown announced greater powers for Parliament, relinquishing the 'Royal perogative' of the government to go to war without a vote, sign foreign treaties, recall or summon parliament. He also called for a public debate on the case for a British Bill of Rights or a written constitution.

So far so good. However, many of these changes, while welcome, are not particularly revolutionary and will see little complaint from opposition parties. More to the point is when he will address the looming issue of Lords Reform (not very popular with Cameron's lot), whether he will really involve people more in policy via a Citizen's convention (thus really relinquishing control), do something to limit airport expansion, do something about buy to let properties (not popular with lots of people who got rich in under Labour), tax private equity (not popular with Brown's mates in the city) or scrap the expensive and inefficient ID cards. The last one is especially unlikely to be as it would see Labour lose face to the Tories who have already made their U-turn.

With the Conservatives about to launch a major policy offensive following their extensive review though, it will be interesting to see what Mr Brown is holding back for later.