I’m a big fan of Sarah Brown. I follow her on twitter.

But I groaned when she walked on stage for the second year running. I thought, though, that she was even better this year, brief, sincere, more confident, and a lot less sugary than last year.

Why, though, couldn’t he just get up and make a speech. If it takes two videos and his wife to get him going, it looks a bit like he hasn’t turned up on time.

He really does need to sort out his smile, though. And “Securing Britain’s Economic Recovery” was certainly not the catchiest of mottos to stick on the plaque in front of him.

A long list of Labour achievements, even if you are unimpressed by some of them, was the right way to start and went down well.

And his early jokes were good, too. “I would say Alistair Darling was the best chancellor we’ve ever had…but the press would report it as ‘Brown subs Brown’ was masterful.

It was a long time before he mentioned the Tories and that’s good.

“The economic call of the century” was a good description of the credit crunch. He’s doing well. He has laboured (sorry) the ‘Tories would do nothing’ line at PMQs this year but this time, it sounds quite fresh.

“Markets need morals” is a superb line and he’s done right to concentrate early on what we all think he’s good at – the economy.

I think the jury’s out on the distinction between a general election for a fourth Labour term and a general election for “the first Labour government of this global age”.

“Getting the deficit down while maintaining and improving front line services” would be a good trick but is it possible?

Restoring the earnings link for all pensioners will go down well…but it doesn’t necessarily mean that much, does it?

Raising the minimum wage and free child care? I’m getting dizzy now. And tackling teenage pregnancies sounds good, too. Now we are into anti-social behaviour with a vengeance. Family intervention projects to get a grip on 50,000 of “the most chaotic families” sounds good.

But punishing parents for broken ASBOs could end up in a mess. What are you going to do, lock them up and put the kids into care?

Giving councils the power to ban 24 hour drinking – even though it doesn’t really exist – sounds a splendid idea. And banning drunks from drinking is a superb line.

So, no compulsory ID cards in the next parliament. What about the one after that?

He’s relaxed and self-assured now. Seems even to be enjoying himself. It’s a round of applause for every sentence, almost.

The NHS stuff is boring but free personal care for the elderly is an impressive promise. And giving constituents the right to recall their MPs is what we all want to hear. Though judging by the reaction in the hall, abolishing hereditary peers is more important to the party faithful.

Gordon Brown finished? Not yet, by any means.