The Labour Party has had some great conferences in the past about coalition options - full of passionate debate, contrasting political philosophies and, as often as not, bitter personal enmities, writes Mark Hennessy, Political Correspondent
However, Saturday's debate in the Brandon Hotel in Tralee is not likely to reach such grand historical heights, unless so-far silent Labour members have a surprise in store for the party leader, Pat Rabbitte.
He should win support, by a substantial margin, for his desire for Labour to enter the next election campaign tied alongside Fine Gael by a vote transfer pact and by some policy unity.
If he were not to do so, his leadership would be badly holed below the waterline - a fact that has been made quietly clear to Labour delegates for some time.
Though many delegates are unhappy, all bar a few recognise that Rabbitte's strategy is either inevitable, or that there is, for now, no other practical choice.
But that is not to say the majority are absolutely convinced Rabbitte's judgment is right, because they are not so persuaded.
They will only become convinced if the Rabbitte gamble works and it takes them into power in 2007, when all will then claim ownership of the success. Otherwise, Rabbitte's policy will be a political orphan, and he will be gone.
The campaign against Rabbitte has been led by Labour's vice-chairman, Henry Haughton, who has been a thorn in the side of a succession of party leaders.
When Haughton has not been on point, the assault has been led by ATGWU union chief Mick O'Reilly, who has been quick to offer advice.
However, O'Reilly's often-hectoring interventions have done as much to hinder as help the anti-Fine Gael cause.
The trade union official is not a full Labour member and cannot attend this weekend's conference as a delegate, so the ATGWU vote on the motion will have to be cast by another.
If passed, the motion tabled by Labour's National Executive Committee deplores "this arrogant, incompetent and wasteful Fianna Fáil/Progressive Democrat" government, acknowledges "that only a different and better government" can realise a fair society, and authorises Mr Rabbitte to agree "a broad common policy agenda" and a vote transfer agreement with "genuinely democratic parties of opposition".
However, a formal proposal to go into government, and approval for a specific programme for government, would still be a matter for a post-election special delegate conference.
The acceptance of such a motion would strongly tie the fortunes of Rabbitte and Fine Gael leader Enda Kenny, even though the current opinion poll trends do not put them within a furlong of Government Buildings.
However, the motion would not absolutely rule out a post-election coalition with Fianna Fáil, even though there is another motion on the programme that would.
This motion, put down by the party's Bray North branch, "directs" Labour to ensure voters "are given the choice of an alternative government to one involving Fianna Fáil or the Progressive Democrats".
So far, there is a noticeable reluctance on the part of the leadership to see that motion going to the floor, though the conference's standing orders committee will have the final decision on Saturday.
The dislike, irritation, and, to some extent, fear generated by Fine Gael within Labour, some of whom still carry bruises from the 1980s despite the more positive experience of the rainbow coalition in the mid-1990s, remains palpable.
In Kenny's first year of leadership, senior Labour figures were openly dismissive of the Mayo man, seeing the opportunity for Rabbitte to take over the mantle of "the real leader of the opposition", as Mr Dick Spring did in the early 1990s.
If that opportunity was open to Rabbitte, then he has failed so far to take it - though he has, to be fair, been consumed by internal party organisation and by the need to get support for his coalition preference.
He has worked hard to garner such support, keeping his door unusually wide open to parliamentary party colleagues and senior constituency figures.
Furthermore, he has earned respect from members who accept he has been entirely consistent, ever since he campaigned for the party leadership, in his determination not to share power with Fianna Fáil.
Once his coalition policy preference is accepted he must pray that Fine Gael, which has had an unerring ability in the past to take Labour for granted once their support had been banked, does not make the same mistake again.
Last year Kenny was forced to quietly warn his TDs, who were still gung-ho after their Lazarus-like performance in the European and local elections, to be careful in their language about their putative coalition partners.
Most heeded the call but old instincts inevitably come to the surface.
Once in an electoral pact Labour will have to ensure that Fine Gael, which is currently emphasising the more conservative side of its personality, concedes policies that are obviously Labour in tone.
The coalition option debate has consumed Labour for months, when it would have been better employed devising policies to attack a Government that is unlikely to be weak on the economy.
In the past the Progressive Democrats have cleverly managed to encourage voters to increase their voice within a coalition.
Labour, on the other hand, has never been able to do so, even though it is hardly a complex message. It must be able to explain it next time.