By turns defiant and conciliatory, Premier Dr. Ewart Brown moved to stamp his leadership on the Progressive Labour Party last week as the party's conference opened.

Although it was fairly clear by the first of Dr. Brown's two speeches that there would be no leadership challenge, the mere fact that he addressed the question in some depth suggests that there was as much fire as smoke in recent reports.

When a leader has to call for unity and loyalty – on which great emphasis was placed – it suggests that there is not much of it about.

Certainly, Dr. Brown might have been remiss not to do so; to ignore the increasingly vocal criticisms might well have invited more of the same, and he does not need that.

He made clear that he plans to remain in office at least until October 2010, when his four-year term in office ends.

Former Cabinet Ministers who have been critical recently of Dr. Brown were basically brushed off and told to get over it. Former Premier Alex Scott was told much the same thing.

Now, Dr. Brown said, was the time to put party before person and to be loyal to the PLP, "to return to the days when we viewed the PLP as our family".

Nor did he say that members should not disagree on issues or direction. Indeed, he said, that was one of the strengths of the PLP.

Most of this is what you might expect any party leader to say.

But context is important. This is the same Dr. Brown who told PLP delegates in 2003 that MPs planning a coup against Dame Jennifer Smith had to "mislead" voters and supporters.

And this is the same Dr. Brown who led that rebellion and refused to serve in Dame Jennifer's Cabinet.

And this is the same Dr. Brown who challenged Alex Scott – legitimately under the PLP constitution – and forced him out, in the process accusing his own party of failing to progress, only to then co-opt the PLP's achievements of the previous nine years in "his" administration's platform and record of accomplishment.

Politics, as the late Dame Lois Browne-Evans remarked, is not kindergarten.

But it's a little rich to hear Dr. Brown call for loyalty and "family" now, when for much of his time in Cabinet he was a leading rebel who rarely missed an opportunity to undermine his leaders.

And his assertion of his labour roots, clearly a bid to rebuff perceptions of his "elitism" and liking for a jet set lifestyle, was selective.

And then there is the matter of the rewriting of history, which is becoming a speciality of the PLP.

Turning to labour relations, on which he spent a good deal of time, Dr. Brown claimed that 30 years ago, "you didn't have the Premier's home number". Actually, the public did. Sir David Gibbons was Premier then and his number was listed, just as it is today. So was that of his predecessor Sir John Sharpe, and so was his successor Sir John Swan's.

The person who does not have his home phone number listed in the phone book today is Dr. Brown.

That's not to say that Dr. Brown was wrong to call for restraint from the trade unions. Unions that down tools without notice are irresponsible, as has been said here before.

But the facts are that the PLP, which argued in 1998 that it would bring about better relations, has signally failed to do so. Trade unions have taken action, more often than not, out of frustration at not being heard. It is not the unions, for the most part, that have not been talking, it is the "labour" Government that has not been listening.

You don't have to look much further than last week's meeting of the select committee on education where a wide range of principals made exactly that point about education reform.

You can tell people that the PLP will listen, you can play the neighbour card, you can bring up the spectre of the "bad old UBP", but in the end you can only be judged on your record. And the record, on labour relations and other issues, just isn't that good.