Tony Blair

Tony Blair at a Labour Party meeting in 2005.Template:Photo

Tony Blair (born 6th May 1953), as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 1997 to 2007, perhaps earned a reputation as one of the most controversial holders of Britain's highest political office. Domestically, his policies gave rise to the term "Blairism", implying a concern for social issues combined with market-based economics, and including an emphasis on the economic aspirations of the individual. Internationally, he was best known for supporting the US-led war in Iraq, the repercussions of which are ongoing in the Middle East and the wider world, but was also known for promoting concern about the state of Africa, which he famously called "a scar on the conscience of the world." Domestically, his legacy included the abolition of the commitment to state ownership of major industries as a fundamental tenet of his ('New') Labour Party, devolved government in Wales and Scotland, and a successful continuation of the work of his predecessors and other governments and parties to end the conflict in Northern Ireland. He currently serves as a Middle East envoy, working to bring about a 'two-state' solution to the conflict over Israel and Palestine.

Current career

On July 27 2007, just a few hours after Blair stood down as Prime Minister, it was announced that he had accepted appointment as a special Middle East envoy [7]. Blair's experience as a Prime Minister might have made him an uncontroversial choice for a Middle East envoy, were he not also one of the main architects of the Iraq War. His appointment by the 'Quartet' of the USA, the United Nations, Russia and the European Union was welcomed by Israel and broadly by the Palestinian Authority, but opposed by the militant Islamic fundamentalist Hamas organisation which currently controls the Gaza Strip. His official role is to work with the Palestinian people to develop the infrastructure and the economy, with the goal of creating a Palestinian state; his initial brief does not include the wider conflict between Israel and Palestinians.

Early life, career and family

The second son of Leo and Hazel Blair, Anthony Charles Lynton Blair was born on 6th May 1953 at the Queen Mary Maternity Home in Edinburgh, Scotland. He has an elder brother, William, who is a barrister and a Queen's Counsel (QC), and a younger sister, Sarah. The family lived first in Paisley Terrace in the Willowbrae area of the city; Leo worked as a junior tax inspector, while studying law at the University of Edinburgh.

Leo Blair was the illegitimate son of two travelling variety actors, Celia Rideway and Charles Parsons (stage name 'Jimmy Lynton', remembered in Tony Blair's middle names). He was adopted by Mary and James Blair, a Glasgow shipyard worker who raised Leo in the Govan area. Hazel was the daughter of George Corscadden, a butcher who came from a family of Protestant farmers in County Donegal, Ireland. George Corscadden had moved to Glasgow in 1916, but had returned to Ballyshannon in 1923, where Hazel was born.

Mary Blair was an active Communist in the 1930s, who was known for vandalising walls with left-wing graffiti; nevertheless, Blair would later draw upon his family history to speak of his adoptive grandmother's time as an era of "respect" and an inspiration for his community policy of the same name, which aimed to tackle 'anti-social behaviour' (such as graffiti). Blair's use of 1930s Govan as an example of a strong community was much-criticised by former residents, who recalled an impoverished area, blighted by crime, and Mary Blair as a strong supporter of peace and socialism - neither of which might be easily associated with Tony Blair's prime ministerial legacy.

Between 1955 and 1959, the Blair family lived in Australia, where Leo lectured in law at the University of Adelaide. On returning to Britain, they lived for a time with Hazel Blair's stepfather, William McClay, and her mother in Stepps, near Glasgow, until Leo found a job as a lecturer at Durham University. Tony spent the rest of his childhood in Durham, England, where he attended Durham's Chorister School. Leo had political ambitions - as a youth he had been secretary of the Scottish Young Communist League - but he became chairman of the local Conservative association, and began to campaign as a Conservative candidate for Parliament; during this campaign, in 1963, Leo had a stroke that left him partially paralysed.

With his father disabled, Blair was sent to Fettes College, an elite private boarding school in Edinburgh. Dr Eric Anderson, his housemaster at Fettes, said "He was intensely argumentative and every school rule was questioned: he could uphold his side of the debate about the rights and wrongs of everything better than any boy in the school.",. He said that Blair was " an expert at testing the rules to the limit, and I wouldn't swear that he stuck rigidly to the rules on not drinking, smoking or breaking bounds. But he was a live wire and fun to have around." Nevertheless he was once given "six of the best" for persistently flouting the school rules, and was was threatened with expulsion.

After Fettes, Blair spent a year in London, supporting himself by stacking shelves at Barkers food hall, in Kensington, before entering Oxford University to study jurisprudence at St John's College. As a student, he played guitar and was lead singer for a rock band called 'Ugly Rumours', something he appeared to take quite seriously ("He even wanted to rehearse," according to band mate Mark Ellen). Just after graduating from Oxford with a second class degree, his mother Hazel died of cancer, which appears to have affected Blair greatly. He began to develop a more thoughtful side, started talking about left wing politics, and became more serious about his Christian faith, taking confirmation classes.

Blair became a member of Lincoln's Inn, the oldest of the four Inns of Court in London to which barristers of England and Wales belong. While enrolled as a pupil barrister, specializing in employment and commercial law, Blair was introduced by his mentor Derry Irvine to Cherie Booth (daughter of actor Tony Booth). Tony Blair married Cherie, a practising Roman Catholic on 29th March 1980; Cherie was a high-flying barrister, with a first class degree in law, who was to become a QC, .

Unusually among students in the early 1970s, Blair seems to have avoided drugs, and there are few reports of him being incapacitated by drink. However, he smoked cigarettes, a habit that Cherie made him quit; he smoked his last one 15 minutes before their wedding.

Tony and Cherie have four children (Euan, Nicky, Kathryn and Leo). Leo (born 20th May 2000) was the first legitimate child of a serving Prime Minister in over 150 years, since Francis Russell was born to Lord John Russell on 11th July 1849.

Early parliamentary and party career

Soon after graduating from Oxford in 1975, Tony Blair joined the Labour Party, and ran unsuccessfully for Parliament in 1982 in the safe Conservative constituency of Beaconsfield. At the 1983 UK general election, he was elected as Member of Parliament (MP) for Sedgefield, County Durham, a constituency that he represented until his retirement as Prime Minister and withdrawal from Parliament in 2007. After the two general election victories by Margaret Thatcher's Conservative Party in 1983 and 1987, Blair aligned himself with the reforming tendencies in the party, headed by leader Neil Kinnock. Kinnock gave Blair his first shadow ministerial post in 1987 as spokesman on City of London affairs, after Blair's failure to win election to the Shadow Cabinet. At his second attempt, he was elected in 1988 as Shadow Secretary of State for Energy. Throughout this time, Blair was developing a reputation as a moderniser, frequently appearing in the media thanks to his close associate, the then Labour Party Director of Communications, Peter Mandelson. He was responsible for dropping the Party's support for the 'closed shop' system, by which, in some trades, all employees had to be trade union members.

When Kinnock resigned after Labour lost again in the 1992 general election, Blair became Shadow Home Secretary under the new leader, John Smith. Recognising that the Conservatives' reputation for being "tough on crime" was an area that Labour needed to move into, he adopted Gordon Brown's summary that the Party's approach would be "tough on crime, tough on the causes of crime".

Leader of the Labour Party, 1994-2007

“I didn't come into politics to change the Labour Party. I came into politics to change the country.”

Clause IV and 'New Labour'

Clause IV of the constitution of the Labour Party declared that one of the aims of the party was To secure for the workers by hand or by brain the full fruits of their industry and the most equitable distribution thereof that may be possible upon the basis of the common ownership of the means of production, distribution and exchange, and the best obtainable system of popular administration and control of each industry or service. The new version reads The Labour Party is a democratic socialist party. It believes that by the strength of our common endeavour we achieve more than we achieve alone, so as to create for each of us the means to realise our true potential and for all of us a community in which power, wealth and opportunity are in the hands of the many, not the few. Where the rights we enjoy reflect the duties we owe. And where we live together, freely, in a spirit of solidarity, tolerance and respect.

In 1983, Blair was elected to Parliament as the member for Sedgefield, a mining constituency in the North of England; at 30, he was the youngest Labour MP. The 1983 Labour manifesto was one of the most left wing ever to be put before the British electorate, including promises to nationalise large parts of industry; it also included proposals for unilateral nuclear disarmament and to leave the European Community. Soon after entering Parliament, Blair led a delegation of mineworkers and their families to London, where he joined Arthur Scargill, the left-wing leader of the National Union of Mineworkers, to petition the National Coal Board about the planned closure of a coke works.

However, Blair did not hide his belief that the Labour Party had to broaden its appeal to middle class voters if it was ever to regain power. In The Northern Echo newspaper, he argued that "to win power for the low-paid, unemployed and the North, we must also appeal to the 60% of the population in private housing, to the employed on the average wage and to the South". This was not a popular message for everyone in the Labour Party, and at one party meeting he was denounced as a "traitor to socialism" by Labour MP Dennis Skinner. Nevertheless, the Labour Party under its new leader Neill Kinnock and under his successor John Smith began the long process of re-inventing itself. By 1994, little had remained of the 1983 manifesto commitments.

Tony Blair was elected as the Leader of the Labour Party in July 1994 after the sudden death of his predecessor, John Smith. He believed that for the Labour party to regain power, it had to decisively renounce some of its traditional policies. In 1995, he persuaded the party at its annual Conference to amend its constitution. In particular, the Conference voted to replace the contoversial Clause IV (see box), which had been drafted by Sidney Webb and had been party policy since 1918. The redrafting marked a radical break with traditional policies, and marked the emergence of what Blair called “New Labour.” The commitment to nationalisation, even though it was widely regarded as rhetoric without practical intent, was widely seen as a major factor in the electoral unpopularity of the Labour party. The Conservative party had won four successive general elections (in 1997, 1983 and 1987 under Margaret Thatcher and in 1992 under John Major), and Labour was by some seen as unelectable while it retained close links with the Trade Union movement and while it espoused the rhetoric of pre-war socialism. Blair thus set out to reassure a country in which, after the years of Thatcher’s government, there had been a wide increase in property ownership, a widening of share ownership, and a marked weakening of Union membership. The Conservative government’s drive to maintain low taxes had led to rising dissatisfaction with the level of investment in public services, particularly in education and health, and Blair exploited this dissatisfaction and the increasing unease about what the media represented as 'sleaze' and complacency within the Conservative government.

Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, 1997-2007

“Power without principle is barren, but principle without power is futile. This is a party of government and I will lead it as party of government.” Tony Blair, on becoming Prime Minister, 1997 "I´m worried about that young man, he's getting awfully bossy." Margaret Thatcher on Tony Blair, quoted in The Irish Times, 6th February 1999

First term in office, 1997-2001

Tony Blair’s party won a landslide victory in the 1997 UK general election. Labour won 419 seats, the Conservatives just 165; Labour had a majority of 179 over all other parties. Blair became, at 43, the youngest Prime Minister since 1812. For this first term in Government, Blair had promised that there would be no increase in income tax and no increase in the overall level of public spending . Blair’s popularity in the country was very high, and although the commitment not to increase public spending led to frustration amongst those Labour Party supporters who had wanted a rapid increase in investment in health and education, his popularity and that of the Labour Party remained high throughout the first term of Government.

Blair's first term mainly addressed issues which required no increase in public spending, such as devolved Government in Scotland and Wales (see below), the Freedom of Information Act . A minimum wagewas introduced for the first time in the UK. The Government also attempted to reform the House of Lords — the second chamber of the UK parliament, which is involved mainly in scrutinizing, revising and ammending legislation, although it can also initiate legislation. Until 1997, members of the Lords were mainly heriditary peers of the realm. The House of Lords Act of 1998 removed the right of most peers to sit in the House of Lords, although an ammendment tabled in the Lords allows 92 hereditary peers to remain pending further reform. [8] This reform did not produce the fully elected chamber that some have sought; the House now mainly comprises members appointed (for life) by Prime Ministers to acknowledge their contribution to public service in many spheres, and they include religious leaders, scientists, and representatives from the Arts and business communities. Whether it is desirable that the second chamber of Parliament should be elected remains controversial in British politics; some feel that its role should be above party politics, and others feel that an elected second chamber would inevitably weaken the authority of the first.

In 1986, Margaret Thatcher had abolished the Greater London Council; the local government authority for London that was, during Thatcher's premiership, dominated by the Labour party. The leader of the Council, Ken Livingstone, had pursued high profile policies that directly countered the national policies of Thatcher's government. Labour had pledged to reverse the abolition of the GLC, and in 1999 created a new Greater London Authority, which for the first time in the UK established a key role for a directly elected Mayor [9]. To Blair's consternation, the first election in 2000 produced a win not for the official Labour candidate, but for Ken Livingstone, who was now a rebellious leftwing Labour MP. Livingstone had been nominated as Labour candidate by local London Labour parties, but was unsympathetic to "New Labour" and was regarded by Blair as a potential electoral liability to Labour nationally . Accordingly the national Labour party rejected Livingstone's nomination; Livingstone refused to accept this and declared that he would stand as an independent candidate against the official Labour candidate, the Blair loyalist Frank Dobson. Livingstone was expelled from the Labour party, but won the election. As Mayor he proved successful and popular, and was re-elected in 2004 - now standing as the offical Labour candidate, having been re-admitted to the party shortly before

Devolution

Politically, one of the legacies of the Blair government has been devolution in both Scotland and Wales. One of the first acts of the first Blair Government was to hold referendums about devolution in Scotland and Wales, in November 1997. These showed clear support for devolution in Scotland, and, following this result, the 1998 Scotland Act established a separate parliament for Scotland with devolved responsibilities in most domestic areas ; The first Scottish Parliament was elected in May 1999. The referendum in Wales also supported devolution, but by a narrow majority and with a small electoral turnout [10] ; accordingly a Welsh National Assembly was established, but with much more limited powers than the Scottish Parliament.

Social Policies

The Blair government pursued a range of socially liberal policies, including the introduction of civil partnerships for gays and lesbians , the end of the ban on gays in Britain's armed forces, and a relaxation of the law on marijuana. However, under the slogan "Tough on crime and tough on the causes of crime" the government increased the numbers of police, and introduced a range of new measures that critics say are infringements of civil liberties. The measures include satellite tracking of prolific offenders, immediate "fixed penalty" fines for a wide range of minor offences, and individual restrictions aimed at limiting antisocial behaviour, especially of youths These changes, in Blair's words, marked the end of the 1960's "liberal consensus" on law and order

Education

"Ask me my three main priorities for government, and I tell you: education, education, education." Tony Blair, speech to Labour party conference, October 1996 "This grammar school boy isn't going to take any lessons from a public school boy on the importance of children from less privileged backgrounds gaining access to university" Conservative leader Michael Howard at Prime Minister's Question time, attacking Blair's plans to fund an increase in access to Higher Education by introducing student "top-up" fees [11]

"Education, education, education" was Tony Blair’s slogan for the 1997 general election, and he consistently increased funding for education above the level of inflation throughout his time in Government – an increase from £29 billion in 1997 to £60 billion in 2007 ; with further rises to £74 billion projected by 2010. Spending per school pupil was £2,500 in 1997, and is projected to be £6,600 in 2010. There has also been a large increase in funding for Universities financing a large increase in access to University education. This too has been controversial, and critics on the left in particular have objected to the introduction for the first time of student fees to pay part of the cost of higher education, while critics on the right believe that the increase in student numbers implies a lowering of educational standards.

Second term in office, 2001-2005

Blair called a fresh general election in May 2001, one year earlier than he was required to, and won a second landslide victory, with an overall majority of 168, though with a much reduced electoral turnout .

Health

The second term in office gave Blair a clear mandate to increase investment in the National Health Service, paving the way for annual increases worth more than 7% in the health budget sustained for the five years to 2007-08. How that money has been spent is politically controversial , with some believing that much has not been spent efficiently. Others, on the political left, have been unhappy in particular with the involvement of the private sector in the funding of many of the new hospitals – under these arrangements some hospitals were built and are owned and managed (partly) privately while being leased for use by the NHS. However, hospital waiting times have been cut dramatically under Labour; the total waiting list fell by 25% in the six years to 2007 - a reduction of 260,000 people. Between 1996 and 2004, there was a 16% drop in cancer deaths and the Government is on track to meet its 2010 target for heart disease early. Nevertheless, the extensive restructuring changes of the NHS are said to have badly affected staff morale.[12] One of legacies of Blair’s government is that all political parties have now accepted that most of the British public want a high quality, publicly managed health service with the principle of free universal delivery of health care. This issue, that once appeared to divide the Labour party from the Conservatives, appears to have become a common goal of UK political parties.

Northern Ireland

"Don't believe anyone who says the British people don't care about the peace process. People in my country care deeply about it, are willing it to work. And in our two countries, it is not just the politicians who have a role to play. No one should ignore the injustices of the past, or the lessons of history. But too often between us, one person's history has been another person's myth. We need not be prisoners of our history." (Tony Blair, speaking to the Irish Parliament, November 1998)

From the 1970's to 1997, more than 3,000 people were killed in Northern Ireland as a result of conflict between nationalist paramilitary groups (mainly the Irish Republican Army - the IRA) and the police and security forces of Northern Ireland, and the British troops that were sent to support those forces, and as a result of terrorist actions by the IRA against civilians. The Thatcher Government had made serious attempts to reach a political settlement of this conflict but by May 1997, this "Peace process" seemed to have been derailed; talks had broken down, and the IRA had abandoned its cease-fire. Tony Blair made resolution of the conflict in Northern Ireland a priority of his Government, and just two weeks after being elected he made a high profile visit to Northern Ireland to give the go-ahead for new talks. In July 1997, the IRA resumed its ceasefire to allow representatives of Sinn Fein (the main nationalist political party and the political arm of the IRA) to take part in negotiations with the Ulster Unionist parties, and with the British and Irish governments. These negotiations, with the involvement also of the Irish government and at times facilitated by the involvement of American politicians (and particularly Bill Clinton, with whom Tony Blair maintained a very close personal friendship), led to the Good Friday Agreement of 1998. That agreement called for a power sharing government of Northern Ireland, conditional on a permanent end to the armed conflict, and disarmament of the paramilitary groups. However, it was opposed on the one hand by the Democratic Unionist party headed by the Reverend Ian Paisley as a sell-out of the majority Protestant unionist population to the terror tactics of the IRA, and, on the other side, led to a breakaway extremist faction of the IRA - the so-called "Real IRA" that briefly resumed terrorist actions and which still poses a terrorist threat. Thus mutual distrust between the two communities of Northern Ireland was slow to recede; nevertheless, the process led to the historic renunciation of armed conflict by the IRA, and to their disarmament . On May 9th, 2007, Ian Paisley was sworn in as the First Minister of the Northern Ireland Assembly, and Martin McGuinness of Sinn Fein, once a prominent IRA commander, was sworn in as his deputy. At the ceremony, the Irish Prime Minister Bertie Ahern praised Blair as a "true friend of peace and a true friend of Ireland," and for "the true determination that he had, for just sticking with it, for 10 tough years."

Europe

"I believe in Europe as a political project. I believe in Europe with a strong and caring social dimension. I would never accept a Europe that was simply an economic market. .. Political Europe and economic Europe do not live in separate rooms. " Tony Blair, speech to the EU parliament, 2005 [13] "You have been very rude, and I have never been spoken to like this before." Then French President Jacques Chirac, to Tony Blair, at the EU enlargement summit in Brussels, October 2002

Tony Blair was, in his speeches, a passionate pro-European, a strong supporter of the European Union and a supporter of its enlargement to include the newly democratic countries of Eastern Europe. In 1998, he signed Britain's agreement to the European Charter of Fundamental Social Rights , which had been adopted as policy by EU Governments in 1989 but not signed by Britain, as the legislation on worker's rights that it entailed had been opposed by the previous Conservative government. He was also a strong proponent of the euro, favouring Britain joining the new common European currency at the earliest feasible opportunity after a referendum of the British people. However, to realise this intent meant overcoming the increasing skepticism of the British public - a skepticism that increased as the British economy flourished while those of its European neighbours faltered. Crucially, Gordon Brown, Chancellor of the Exchequer and Blair's key partner in Government, refused to countenance joining the euro until the economic conditions were "right", setting five conditions that had first to be met[14]. In essence, Brown declared that monetory union would disrupt Britain's economy unless, by then, the economies of Britain and the EU had converged, with similar interest rates and inflation rates. However, as Britain's economy continued to outpace that of the EU, the prospects of Britain joining the euro seem to have receded since 1997. Blair's aquiescience to Gordon Brown in this frustrated some of the most ardent pro-Europeans, particularly those in the Liberal Democrat party, who felt that the long-term political (and long-term economic) benefits of greater European Union outweighed any short-term economic consequences; these felt that after 1997 Tony Blair's personal standing was so high that he would have won any referendum despite the hostility of the media and despite the reservations of large parts of the British electorate.

Blair's negotiations with other EU leaders however were marked by frequent disagreements notably about the Common Agricultural Policy, and about the size of Britain's contributions to the EU budget. Blair's relationship with French President Jacques Chirac in particular was notably frosty.

The USA - the special relationships

"And our job, my nation that watched you grow, that you fought alongside and now fights alongside you, that takes enormous pride in our alliance and great affection in our common bond, our job is to be there with you. You are not going to be alone." Tony Blair, speech to the U.S. Congress accepting the Congressional Gold Medal, July 2003[15] "I've heard he's been called Bush's poodle.... He's bigger than that. This is just background noise, a distraction from big things...Somehow our relationship has been seen as Bush saying to Blair 'jump' and Blair saying 'how high?' but that's just not the way it works. It's a relationship where we say were both going to jump together." George Bush, interview with the Sun newspaper June 2007 quoted by CBS News [16]

In the wake of World War II, Winston Churchill spoke of fostering a "special relationship" between Britain and the USA, as a bulwark against the threat of communist expansion into an unsettled Europe. For all British Prime Ministers since, maintaining a strong alliance with the USA has seemed to be a major priority of foreign policy, one which has sometimes caused discontent among Britain's European neighbours, who have at times and for various reasons felt threatened by the "Anglo-Saxon" alliance. The obvious political affinities between Bill Clinton and Tony Blair made it natural perhaps that they would become friends as well as political allies.Together, they tried to create a new political center ground under the banner of “the third way.” In alliance, they launched the Operation Desert Fox bombing raids in Iraq in 1998, and took NATO to war against Slobodan Milosevic in Kosovo in 1999. When the Monica Lewinsky story broke in the press, Blair stood by Clinton; when asked if this was not “politically risky” he said of Clinton, “I have found him throughout someone I could trust, someone I could rely upon, someone I am proud to call not just a colleague, but a friend … And my belief is that the right thing to say is what you feel.”

This closeness to Clinton posed a clear problem when George Bush was elected as president of the USA. Whereas the Democrats had forged links with the Labour Party, the Republicans had forged links with the Conservatives, this, and Bush's clear antipathy towards Clinton did not bode well for the special relationship.

However, regardless of any personal friendship for Clinton, Blair rapidly set about forming an equally strong relationship with Bush - and was remarkably successful in doing so. After the terrorist attacks of September 11 2001, Blair committed Britain to stand "shoulder to shoulder" with the USA against terrorism, and backed that up by sending large numbers of British troops to Afghanistan. The next month, in an address to the Labour Party conference, Blair said of the American people: "We were with you at the first. We will stay with you till the last."

In 2003, The U.S. Congress awarded Blair the Congressional Gold medal On July 18 2003 Tony Blair gave his acceptance speech to the joint Houses of Congress, a speech that included the gentle reminder to his audience, "As Britain knows, all predominant power seems for a time invincible, but, in fact, it is transient."

Economy

"The longest period of economic growth since records began, an economy now bigger than that of Italy and France. The lowest unemployment and highest employment rate of any of our competitors for the first time since the 1950s. Living standards up, for everyone, and for the poorest up most. The biggest reductions in child poverty and biggest increases in investment for decades." (Tony Blair's claimed achievements, speech to the Labour Party conference, 2004

Underpinning the Blair government's increase in public spending on education and health without raising the level of income tax was a sustained period of economic growth, sometimes credited to the Chancellor Gordon Brown. A key element of this is believed to be the early decision of the Blair government to devolve the power to set interest rates to an independent body - the Bank of England, subject only to politically determined objectives for the rate of inflation and the overall level of public spending. This decision meant in practice that interest rates could no longer be manipulated by the government in power to produce a 'false' economic boom for mere electoral reasons, and led to a steady low level of inflation, and a steady, stable rate of economic growth.

Iraq

“This is not the time to falter. This is the time for this house, not just this government or indeed this prime minister, but for this house to give a lead, to show that we will stand up for what we know to be right, to show that we will confront the tyrannies and dictatorships and terrorists who put our way of life at risk, to show at the moment of decision that we have the courage to do the right thing." Tony Blair, speech to the House of Commons, March 2003, moving the motion to approve military involvement in Iraq. "We are supposed to admire the Prime Minister because he is a man without doubts and one shorn of scepticism—two of the greatest qualities that the British people have. He just knows that he is right and is therefore prepared to ignore the advice of virtually all the leaders of the great religions in the world, including the Pope and our own archbishop. I find that approach rather frightening." Brian Sedgemoor Labour MP, opposing the motion[17] "Tony Blair has made it known, in connection with his part in the Iraqi war, that he is ready to meet his Maker. Whether his Maker is ready to meet Tony Blair is another matter. In God's sandals, I think I should plead a previous engagement." Keith Waterhouse, Daily Mail columnist [18]

Tony Blair’s single biggest political problem was his support for military action to displace Saddam Hussein in Iraq. He justified this policy by his repeated declarations that he believed the evidence of British and American intelligence sources that Saddam Hussein possessed and was further accumulating Weapons of Mass Destruction that posed a serious and imminent threat to world security. He tried to persuade the United Nations (UN) to act collectively against Saddam Hussain. The UN Security Council had passed UN resolution 1441which directed Iraq to allow UN weapons inspectors to verify that Iraq had disposed of all its weapons of mass destruction, as it had been required to do by earlier resolutions; Saddam insisted that Iraq had complied fully, but he impeded the work of the weapons inspectors and ultimately expelled them from Iraq. Resolution 1441 states, in part, that the Security Council "has repeatedly warned Iraq that it will face serious consequences as a result of its continued violations of its obligations." Britain and the USA urged the UN to act against Iraq in accord with this clause, but when the Security Council failed to endorse military intervention, Blair supported the US decision to invade Iraq regardless. He believed that the consequences of a unilateral military action by the USA would be inevitably graver than those of a multilateral action, however limited the involvement of other countries: "I have come to the conclusion after much reluctance that the greater danger to the UN is inaction: that to pass resolution 1441 and then refuse to enforce it would do the most deadly damage to the UN's future strength, confirming it as an instrument of diplomacy but not of action, forcing nations down the very unilateralist path we wish to avoid."

The decision to support Iraq was supported by the opposition Conservative Party and opposed mainly by a minority of rebels within the Labour party. However, the outcome of the invasion of Iraq, and the failure to find Weapons of Mass Destruction, profoundly affected Blair’s credibility and his popularity, as a general perception grew that Blair had misled the UK parliament and public. In September 2004, during the Labour Party annual conference, the London Evening Standard reported details of a leaked Pentagon briefing paper, "Operation Iraqi Freedom: Strategic Lessons Learned"[19]. The document shows that the Pentagon had finalized its Operational Battle Plan for the Iraq war in October 2002, at a time when Blair was declaring that no decisions had been made about whether to go to war.

Third term in office, 2005-2007

Despite widespread vehement criticsm of Blair for his policies on Iraq, the opposition parties were unable to exploit this fully, having themselves supported the decision to go to war. In May 2005 Blair won a third general election for Labour, but with a much reduced overall majority of 64 seats. In his own Sedgefield constituency, Blair won with a reduced (but still overwhelming) majority of 18,457 votes. [20]

Blair had won three general elections against three different Conservative Party leaders (John Major, William Hague and Michael Howard); a fourth (Ian Duncan-Smith) had come and gone without fighting an election. Blair had been criticised from the left for not doing more to redistribute wealth, and from the right for increasing taxes and Government spending; both were neutered by the steady growth in the economy. Blair for long periods seemed to have a sure touch with public opinion, never more so that,in the wake of the death of Princess Diana in 1997, his tribute to her seemed spontaneous and sincere, and in marked contrast with the stilted and formulaic tributes from others. His description of her as "the people's princess" is one that stuck in the public's mind.

Attacks on Blair from the media never seemed to stick, leading him to be called 'Teflon Tony'; the Press gave him the nickname "Bambi", but this and the mocking of his smile seemed to exhaust their satirical powers to diminish him . His policies, whether they reflected his personal convictions or mere political expediency, often seemed populist rather than left-wing or right-wing. For this, he was criticised as lacking conviction; except on Iraq, where he led from personal conviction and was criticised for not listening. Whereas Margaret Thatcher had been a generally unpopular leader granted power through success in the Falklands War, aided by a disorganised and disunited opposition, Blair had been a generally popular leader ultimately denied power by the failures in Iraq, although sustained by a disorganised and disunited opposition. Margaret Thatcher had been forgiven the small dishonourabilities of war (the sinking of the Belgrano); what successes there had been in Iraq (removal of Saddam Hussein, generally regarded as a brutal dictator) were forgotten.

However, Blair had claimed the "middle ground" of British politics for Labour; lately, the Conservative Party under its new leader David Cameron moved left to challenge that hegemony. For the first time since he was elected leader, the Conservatives moved ahead of Labour in the polls. The Labour Party sensed that it was time for Blair to go.

Allies in Government

Blair's Governments reflected a balance of power between Blair and Gordon Brown, the Chancellor of the Exchequer throughout Blair's time in office. Blair and Brown had been long-standing friends and close political allies, but Brown's own ambitions to hold the highest office himself, and important differences in emphasis on several issues, especially Europe, led to this central relationship becoming strained; the Cabinet became effectively a coalition of Blair's allies and Brown's. A key Blair supporter was John Prescott, elected as Deputy Leader of the Labour Party in 1994, and appointed as Deputy Prime Minister throughout Blair's tenure. Prescott, as a traditional "old Labour" working class Trade Unionist, played a vital role in ensuring the acceptance of Blair's reforms of the Labour Party by the Trade Unions and by Labour Party activists. Another close Blair ally was David Blunkett, Education Secretary from 1997 to 2001 and Home Secretary from 2001 to 2004. Blunkett's blindness made him unvulnerable to personal attack from the media, and his tough image on law and order made him equally invulnerable to political attack from the right. He eventually resigned after a series of personal indiscretions made his continued role in Government untenable[21].

Others in Blair's "inner circle" of advisors were to be much more controversial, none more so than Peter Mandelson and Press Secretary Alistair Campbell. These men were key to the Public Relations campaigns, which began as "charm offensives" to woo the media to sympathy with New Labour aspirations. Labour had long struggled with media antagonism; most national newspapers in the UK traditionally favoured the Conservatives, often outspokenly. Remarkably, in the 1997 general election, many traditional Conservative papers such as the Sun backed Labour. The Daily Mail still backed the Conservatives although its owner, Lord Rothermere personally had switched to supporting Labour; of the national newspapers, only Conrad Black's Daily Telegraph unreservedly supported the Conservative cause.[22]

However, what started as effective public relations was seen as degenerating into "spin" - active management of the media to promote Blair's image by distorting news stories, and the media began to turn increasingly against Blair.

Resignation and departure as Prime Minister

Resignation announcement

"Tony Blair gave a brilliant farewell demonstration of the gifts that have enabled him to dominate politics for such a preposterous length of time. His lethal blend of self-righteousness, good manners and amiability permitted him to control his last appearance as Prime Minister and turn it into a celebration of himself." Andrew Gimson, writing in the right-wing Daily Telegraph newspaper. See here for a video of Tony Blair's final appearance in the House of Commons for Prime Minister's Questions.

10th May 2007 marked the official announcement of the end of Blair's premiership, with a departure date set for the following 27th June. In a speech made in his Sedgefield constituency, Blair announced a timetable for leaving office, paving the way for his successor Gordon Brown after over ten years of power. In words that emphasised his domestic record more than his international influence, Blair credited his government with lowering crime, stabilising the economy and improving public services; he also emphasised that it had placed the UK at the forefront of fighting terrorism, tackling climate change and providing aid to troubled regions such as Africa. Often accused of having a fervently religious approach to wider issues, he also remained committed to the view that time would see his decision-making vindicated:

I did what I thought was right. I may have been wrong, that's your call, but I did what I thought was right for our country.

An apology for his most-criticised activities was unforthcoming. In concluding, however, Blair admitted that he had made unspecified mistakes:

My apologies to you for the times I've fallen short. But good luck.

Final acts as Prime Minister

Tony Blair's final appearances as an international politician were at the 2007 Group of Eight (G8) summit held between some of the world's most economically powerful states, and a meeting of the European Council of European Union countries. These actions would be expected from a premiership often strongly focused on issues outside the UK's borders, though Blair's intention to bring the country closer to its European partners was not entirely fulfilled. Back in Britain, Blair's final days as Prime Minister saw his name rarely out of the national press: he called the media a "feral beast" while admitting his government's early desire to 'spin' stories may have aggravated this issue; and he strongly criticised the proposed academic boycott on Israeli universities in one of his final performances in the House of Commons (the elected chamber of the UK Parliament). He reaffirmed his view that the House of Lords should remain appointed rather than elected.

Departure

27th June 2007 saw Tony Blair resign as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom; his final act in office was to appear for the usual weekly questions to the premier in the House of Commons, where political friends and foes alike paid tribute to some of his record, such as his achievements for long-term peace in Northern Ireland. Blair conceded that he had "never pretended to be a great House of Commons man", acknowledging the view that his tenure had seen moves to sideline Parliament; and he apologised for the dangers British troops faced in Iraq. His words of farewell underlined the finality of the event:

I wish everyone, friend or foe, well and that is that, the end.

Immediately after leaving office, Blair severed his final link with UK domestic politics by stepping down as Member of Parliament.

External links

• tonyblairoffice.org - Official site with details of Tony Blair's post-Downing Street career.
• Tony Blair archive - official record of Tony Blair's speeches, films and podcasts from the UK Prime Minister's website.
• The Blair Years 1997-2007 - BBC articles covering major events of Tony Blair's premiership, with analysis.
• The New York Times - Includes short biography and links to NY Times articles relating to Tony Blair.
• Tony Blair, issue by issue by Tom Bentley; English edition, Le Monde diplomatique, February 2003. Extract: "He's tough on national security, he has an alternative global vision, people like him and he is a beautiful, reassuring speaker. He's Bill Clinton without baggage."
• Blair for U.S.President Thomas Friedmann, The Guardian, December 2002
• Why does New Labour stand for nothing? by Josie Appleton, 2005, in Spiked. Extract: "Blair-bashing has become good sport for the commentators, as they line up to expose the prime minister’s character flaws: arrogant, a control freak, cares only about power and his own reputation, and lacking in political vision."

Books

• Abse, Leo (2001) Tony Blair: The Man Behind the Smile. Robson Books, ISBN 1-86105-364-9 Written by a former, left-wing Labour MP, updated as Tony Blair: the man who lost his smile Robson Books, ISBN1861056982. Reviewed ("Mugged by an 86-year-old")in the New Statesman magazine. Extract: "Adolescent dreams of new regenerative politics acted out in rock [music] may be tolerable. But when the dream of rebirth is elaborated into a political manifesto, then we are placed on the alert; for this is the poison offered by the Nazi and fascist hucksters and accepted by their dupes."
• Beckett F, Hencke D (2004) The Blairs and Their Court. Aurum Press, ISBN 1-84513-024-3 See extracts here.
• Beckett F, Hencke D (2006)The Survivor: Tony Blair in Peace and War . Aurum Press, ISBN 184513110X. Written by two investigative journalists, this book was nominated for Britain’s Channel 4 "Political Book of the Year" Award.
• Blair, Tony (2004) New Britain: My Vision of a Young Country. Westerview Press, ISBN 081334235X. Review ("I'll not buy a book by that terrible little man")in the right-wing Spectator magazine.
• Campbell, Alastair (2007) The Blair Years: The Alastair Campbell Diaries. Knopf, ISBN 0307268314. By the controversial Press Secretary to Tony Blair. Review ("Not such a lovely bloke") in The Guardian and another ("Vivid, intriguing, boastful - and honest") in The Times. Extract: "April 2003: Clare [Short] was rabbiting on more than ever. I slipped TB [Tony Blair] a note about the time Saddam shot his health minister at a meeting because she was annoying him and did he want me to get a gun? 'Yes,' he scribbled."
• Gould, Philip (1999) The Unfinished Revolution: How the Modernisers Saved the Labour Party. Abacus, ISBN 0-349-11177-4. Written by one of Blair's strategists. Reviewed in the Independent newspaper("No wonder Tony is a control freak")
• Naughtie, James (2001) The Accidental American: Tony Blair and the Presidency. Macmillan, ISBN 1-4050-5001-2. James Naughtie is a broadcaster with the BBC, and political journalist. Interview inThe Washington Post.
• Naughtie, James (2002) The Rivals. Fourth estate, ISBN 1841154741 The hardback version was subtitled Blair and Brown: the Intimate Story of a Political Marriage. Inspired the Channel Four televion drama The Deal.[23] Reviewed by The New Statesman ("...James Naughtie was paid more than £300,000 for the inside story on Blair and Brown. But his book was received with boredom and indifference.")
• Rawnsley, Andrew (2000) Servants of the People: The Inside Story of New Labour. Hamish Hamilton, ISBN 0-241-14029-3. Rawnsley is a broadcaster and political journalist; he is Chief Political Commentator and Associate Editor for the Observer, a British Sunday newspaper. Review ("United they stand") in the New Statesman, October 2000.
• Rentoul, John (2001) Tony Blair: Prime Minister. Little Brown, ISBN 0-316-85496-4. First sentence: "Tony Blair's political ambition began at the age of eleven, when his father Leo's ended, on 4 July 1964."
• Paul Richards (Editor) (2004) Tony Blair In His Own Words. Politico's Publishing, ISBN 1842750895 Collection of Blair's speeches and writings.
• Riddell, Peter (2004) The Unfulfilled Prime Minister: Tony Blair and the End of Optimism. Politico's Publishing, ISBN 1-84275-113-1. Review (..Where did it all go wrong?") in the New Statesman.
• Seldon, Anthony (2004) Blair. Free Press, ISBN 0-7432-3211-9. Written by a historian and social commentator; see Selson on video "Tony Blair in History": introducing a Conference on "What ever happened to Cool Britannia? The UK after eight years of Blair." Montreal, August 2005.
• Short, Clare (2004) An Honourable Deception? New Labour, Iraq, and the Misuse of Power. Free Press, ISBN 0-7432-6392-8. Clare Short was a left-wing minister in Blair's Cabinet; she resigned three times; twice in protest at Government policies in the two Gulf Wars and once in a protest against anti-terrorism legislation[24].
• Stephens, Philip (2004) Tony Blair: The Making of a World Leader. Viking Books. ISBN 0-670-03300-6. Written by a senior editor of The Financial Times. Review ("A man for all seasons.") in The Economist. Extract: [For Blair,] "ending the tyranny in Iraq was a moral cause fully in accord with the teachings on just wars of Saint Augustine and Thomas Aquinas."
• Stothard, Peter (2003) Thirty Days: Tony Blair and the Test of History HarperCollins, ISBN 0060582618. Review in The New Yorker. Sir Peter Stophard is a former Editor of The Times.

See Also

• List of Prime Ministers of the United Kingdom
• Gordon Brown
• George W. Bush