Blunkett sets out on comeback

With a mere 1,482 votes separating the Tories and Labour, Hornchurch is a sliver of a marginal. It has a hard-Left Labour MP, John Cryer - one of the unlikely prizes won in the heart of the old Thatcherite Essex belt when New Labour still performed election miracles.

Now it looks like a doomed seat - a constituency slipping rightwards to the Conservatives, BNP and UKIP in local elections. So why is the former Home Secretary David Blunkett arriving, guide dog and protection squad in tow, to address a meeting of disgruntled residents?

"I am here campaigning on behalf of the Labour Party," Mr Blunkett replies with a twinkle. Mr Cryer needs all the help he can get.

Accepting the uphill tasks of defending the most difficult marginals is a sign of Mr Blunkett's determination to work his way back to Cabinet politics. He does not look like a man who wants to hang around on the margins for long.

In a neat suit and a trendy Richard James scarf, he has made a physical recovery since his gaunt appearance at the height of his stand-off with his former lover and mother of his child, Kimberly Quinn. Last week, he secured interim access of two hours a month to their son William.

Friends say he has spent "well over ?40,000" on legal fees and that the figure is climbing. He has taken to after-dinner speaking to pay the costs and his adult sons have chipped in. The access battle has become a Blunkett family cause - he uses the word "we", not "I" to describe it.

A final decision is said to be imminent and Mr Blunkett is confident the two-hours access arrangement will be increased and that he will no longer be required to see the child in the presence of a female minder.

The angry exchanges of last year have been replaced by a more conciliatory tone as he seeks a "civilised" settlement with Mrs Quinn. But he has also made clear there is "zero chance" of him giving up on the crusade to maintain a full relationship with his son.

Clearing up the messy entanglements of that affair is not only a personal matter - it is a prerequisite for Mr Blunkett's return to Cabinet.

His allies claim the former home secretary would act as a balance to the Chancellor's mighty weight and policy influence. Mr Blunkett hasn't ruled out the role of foreign secretary if Jack Straw moves on - and he is still keen to promote himself as an ardent domestic reformer and ally of Tony Blair in a third term.

Number 10 is grateful for the added Blunkett firepower - especially as immigration and crime are relentless Tory themes and Charles Clarke is a relative newcomer.

In drab Rainham, where working-class enclaves and neat lower-middle class estates are cheek by jowl, the mood with Labour is sour. There is disappointment tinged with a sense that the Government has failed to control crime and immigration. There is, Mr Cryer says, "vast concern about immigration but hardly any immigrants". It is plum territory for Michael Howard, whose posters focusing on the issue are prominent.

The first question is raised by a man who describes immigration bluntly as "a subject which is a sore point for everyone in this country".

Mr Blunkett answers that he was the one who opened reception centres and presided over a fall in the asylum figures after securing the closure of the Sangatte camp.

But the audience is unconvinced. One man says: "Put them in a barracks." Another adds: "Or a transit camp." No one demurs. However tough the ex-home secretary considers himself to have been it is not tough

enough for the residents of Hornchurch. And these are the ones who turn out for a Labour event.

Things get no easier when it comes to anti-social behaviour. Mr Blunkett boasts of how he forced through Asbos against sceptical colleagues and councils. "Asbos don't stop them," shouts one man.

The room bristles with anecdotes of vandalism and gangs. One policeman was thrown through a plate glass window when he tried to arrest a group of youths.

"What hope is there for us, Mr Blunkett, when they treat the police like this?" says a middle-aged woman. "They were lucky to find any police on the streets," says a man with a crew cut.

The clubs and binge-drinking culture of Romford worry parents and the words "out of control" echo around the room. Mr Blunkett makes a game go of suggesting ways in which Mr Cryer - should he survive as MP - could ensure the latest batch of initiatives on anti-social behaviour are followed through more quickly.

The reaction is muted. No one bears the former home secretary actual ill-will, but there is a sense they have heard all this too often to be impressed, or even hopeful.

Curfews? Dispersal orders. Parenting classes? They've heard it all before. No one mentions Tony Blair.

But the message could not be clearer - these ideas for controlling crime are fine in theory but they don't work. And few in the audience were still prepared to give the Government the benefit of the doubt simply for trying.