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Please don't be confused by the name at the top of this entry. It may say Betsan Powys but this is Adrian Masters filling in for the week.

While Betsan suns herself and sips mojitos, here the clocks have gone back and the nights are drawing in. Thanks for the welcoming comments by the way. I'll do my best to keep the blog warm for the next week.

I'm sure the Welsh Labour leadership battle is uppermost in Betsan's mind as she starts her short break. It's certainly uppermost in the minds of the three candidates as they start the next phases of their campaigns.

One of the main things they each surely have to do over the next couple of weeks is highlight their differences from each other. This is always tricky to do for politicians in the same party because it risks opening divisions. Yet not to do so is also risky because it leaves the candidates open to accusations that they're all the same.

That's precisely the charge levelled by Dr. Richard Wyn Jones in last night's Westminster Hour on Radio 4. He blamed the voting system itself, the complicated electoral college that would-be leaders have to win.

"You've got to say nice things about the unions; you've got to say nice things about the Co-operative party; you've got to say nice things about Labour students," he said.

"This is a system designed for blandness and what we're seeing in the election so far is a fairly bland collection of remarks about change and develoopment and reaching out - all kinds of predictable stuff."

I should say that was given pretty short shrift by the three camps when I spoke to them.

A spokesman for Carwyn Jones rejected out of hand the claim that party rules are somehow constraining debate. "Labour's having a great time" he enthused.

A spokesman for Edwina Hart said the contest may have started blandly but clear dividing lines are beginning to show.

And a spokesman for Huw Lewis said that Mr Lewis' policies are the product of more than two years' work. Any blandness in the contest, says the Lewis camp, comes from the other two agreeing with ideas their man has set out.

Another difference could be seen in campaign leaflets received by Labour party members over the weekend.

Carwyn Jones' includes a photograph of the candidate with Gordon Brown and the caption "The Prime Minister thanking Carwyn at Labour Conference 2009 for his work in Wales."

Did this give Mr Jones an unfair advantage I asked the spokesmen? People have raised it with us said the Lewis camp but we're not making an issue of it. Neither are we said the Hart team.

Not an endorsement said the Jones spokesman emphatically. Just a photo at conference. "It's a shame not all three candidates were there (at the conference) to have their pictures taken with him."

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