July 2016: The Chilcot report into Britain’s role in the Iraq War is published. It is critical of Tony Blair’s Labour government. Blair & Brown: The Labour Revolution IV, captions
Also about my fear that if we left America on its own in the circumstances without trying to build a coalition, the consequences will be much worse. ibid. Blair
I think that Blair’s increasing closeness to Bush baffled people because he was seen as superficial, he was seen as right wing, and he was seen as too narrow American interests. ibid. Diane Abbot
12 days after President Bush addresses the UN, a 50-page dossier compiled by British Intelligence is made public. ibid. caption
The relationship was in a pretty bad way. As the election started there was a real problem and that’s why they had to be brought back together and made to campaign together. Blair & Brown: The Labour Revolution V, Jonathan Powell, chief of staff
By then I’d come to the recognition there was a difference in policy terms that was not going to be resolved. ibid. Blair
17 Labour MPs including a minister signed a letter calling on Tony Blair to go and go soon. ibid. news
48 hours after the ‘coup’ begins, Tony Blair and Gordon Brown meet to discuss the succession. ibid. caption
27th June 2007: Gordon Brown, elected unopposed as Labour leader, becomes prime minister. ibid.
Enter one of Britain’s wealthiest tycoons: Bernie Ecclestone, the pint-sized ringmaster of Formula One. With Blair’s approval, Ecclestone had secretly given new Labour a £1,000,000 donation. Just before the election. So he needed no introduction one day in October 1997 when he went to ask the prime minister for a favour. Bernie Ecclestone had a big request: new Labour were about to ban tobacco advertising from all major sporting events. Ecclestone wanted Formula One exempted, and for a small guy he must have been pretty persuasive, because after just one meeting with the prime minister, Tony Blair asked his health minister to do a U-turn and exempt Formula One ... They tried to cover up the details of what had happened. Andrew Marr’s History of Modern Britain, BBC 2007
In 1994 Tony Blair had become the leader of the Labour Party. And the reforming group centred around Peter Mandelson became all powerful. Almost every night Philip Gould ran focus groups with swing voters in the suburbs. Adam Curtis, The Century of the Self IV: Eight People Sipping Wine in Kettering, BBC 2002
New Labour are faced with a dilemma. The system of consumer democracy that they have embraced has trapped them into a series of short-term and often contradictory policies. ibid.
Both Tony Blair and George Bush became possessed by the idea of ridding the world of Saddam Hussein. So possessed, that they believed any story that proved his evil intentions. And the line between reality and fiction became every more blurred. Adam Curtis, HyperNormalisation, BBC 2016
The ultimate political goal at the heart of our age is the idea of individual freedom. In Britain our government has set out to create a revolution that will free individuals from old elites and bureaucracies. A new world where we are free to choose our lives not be trapped by class or income into predestined roles … ‘To liberate Britain from all the old class divisions, old structures, old prejudices [Blair] …’ Adam Curtis, The Trap: What Happened to Our Dream of Freedom: Fuck You Buddy, BBC 2007
Politicians in the West had given large parts of their power away. What had begun with Bill Clinton in the early 1990s had spread. When Tony Blair came to power he had immediately given control over much of the economy to the Bank of the England. But in 1998 the global financial system showed how unstable it could be. An economic crisis that begun in Russia and then spread to Asia had consequences throughout the world. Adam Curtis, Can’t Get You Out of My Head IV: But What if the People are Stupid? BBC 2021
In the north of England factories began to close. Tony Blair insisted that it was a price the country had to pay if it wanted to be a part of what he called the world economy. ibid.
The politicians switched sides and became instead the representatives of the new powerful technocratic class. It still looked like they were powerful and had control over events. ibid.
Blair came to Kosovo 1999 and was welcomed as a hero. At the refugee camp Blair presented what they had done as an expression of that epic vision … ‘We are all one world simply linked together as individuals … and we the good politicians of the west have a duty to intervene to help the victims of all evil dictators wherever they may be in the world … This is a battle for humanity. It is a just cause.’ ibid.
Tony Blair was an admirer of Margaret Thatcher … I could never quite understand why Tony Blair was in the Labour Party. Ken Clarke, 26th July 2023