World Notes BRITAIN

Can Britain's Labor Party reverse its decline? That was the question at the heart of the opposition party's five-day annual conference in Brighton last week. The answer: not easily.

Under a banner that read MOVING AHEAD, party leaders and 1,400 mostly dispirited delegates agreed to a formal reappraisal of Labor's direction, following three straight electoral losses to Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher's Conservatives. With an eye toward broadening party appeal, Labor promised to reassess even such sacred party tenets as state ownership of industry and unilateral nuclear disarmament, which Deputy Party Leader Roy Hattersley called the "major vote loser" in the past election. Party Leader Neil Kinnock said, "We have got to appeal to the voters we need."

The planned review brought a lash of criticism from left-wing delegates. "Champagne Socialism," they called the new thrust, grumbling that the party was abandoning its traditions to court the growing middle-class voters. Said Leftist Stalwart Tony Benn: "The part at the top is in a panic-stricken rout and is prepared to say almost anything in an attempt to pick up votes."

Kinnock denied that Labor would "jettison our commitments" or that the party was "retreating or pandering to yuppies." Instead, he argued that the new tilt was a concession to "social realities." When a worker earns $600 a week, owns his own house, car and a vacation retreat in Spain, the party leader declared, "you do not say, 'Let me take you out of your misery, brother.' "