Tony Blair Archive from November 1997
From an article by Tony Blair in The News of the World, November 30, 1997:
"I dropped in on Joyce and Ted Hawkes for tea this week. They are a pensioner couple living on a South London housing estate.
"The Chancellor had just announced that every pensioner is to get £20 this winter to help with fuel bills, and pensioners on income support £50. Joyce and Ted told me of the contrast between this winter, when their fuel bills are coming down, and last winter when they had to pay the Tories VAT on heating.
"Already, they said, a Labour government is making a difference.
"Millions more feel the same ..."
From The Sunday Times, November 30, 1997:
"...Last week Tony Blair attempted to ease nervousness over fears that the government was not taking the problem seriously enough. He insisted that the government was on course to tackle the millennium problem in public-sector computers in a programme that could cost about £1 billion.
"Robin Guernier of Taskforce 2000, an independent group that has tried to raise awareness of the bug, remains unconvinced by Labour's statement. He is critical of the government's role in tackling the problem and believes the Action 2000 group set up by the Department of Trade and Industry has already wasted time in getting the importance of the situation across to businesses.
"Guernier says: 'While Action 2000 is a good idea, the fact thet Don Cruickshank, its head, is dedicating only one day a week to it is pitiful.'"
From The Sun, November 29, 1997:
"Tough-talking Tony Blair yesterday warned Bosnian war criminals they will be hunted down by the SAS.
"He vowed the elite unit would hound Radovan Karadzic and Ratko Mladic, who are on the UN wanted list.
"Mr Blair - visiting British troops in the former Yugoslavia - declared: 'These people should be brought to justice. We have played our part in that and will continue to do so'..."
From The House of Commons Select Committee on Health report, November 28, 1997:
"We are particularly concerned at the Government's proposal to seek an EC Directive which contains provision for a permanent exemption for Formula One. We believe that Formula One should be placed under the same pressure as other sports to seek alternative sponsorship."
From The House of Commons Select Committee on European Legislation report, November 27, 1997:
"It appeared from the Minister's evidence that no very exacting assessment of the relative dependence of different sports on tobacco sponsorship had been carried out. On Formula One, she told us that "it is very hard to get accurate figures"; that the estimates for sponsorship in the UK were about £35 million and £100 million worldwide; but she did not know what percentage of the sport's income this represented."
From Peter Riddell's column in The Times, November 28, 1997:
"The Blairisation of Whitehall took a further important step forward yesterday. The prosaically entitled Report of the Working Group on the Government Information Service is as revealing a document about how the Blair administration works as has so far appeared - confirming the key roles of Peter Mandelson and Alastair Campbell...
"... The official emphasis is on co-ordination, but the consistent theme is centralisation, a desire to strengthen the ability of the Prime Minister's Office, not just to present a coherent message but also to influence the development of policy throughout Whitehall..."
From The Times, November 28, 1997:
"Tony Blair came under renewed pressure over the Formula One affair yesterday as two Commons committees strongly criticised his decision to exempt motor racing from the tobacco sponsorship ban.
"The Commons health and European legislation committees rushed out reports seriously questioning the Prime Minister's justification for the special treatment of Formula One.
"The reports, from two heavily Labour-dominated committees, mark the first criticism of the Government by a select committee ..."
From The Daily Telegraph, November 28, 1997:
"Tony Blair was facing an unprecedented double challenge to his authority last night from his own back benches.
"More than 120 MPs signed a confidential letter urging the Chancellor to delay cuts in lone parent benefits while two Labour-dominated committees rejected the government's arguments for exempting motor racing from the tobacco sports sponsorship ban.
"It represents the most serious sign of Labour backbench unease since the party came to power six months ago ...."
From The Scotsman, November 28, 1997:
"The Government faces the prospect of a huge back-bench revolt after more than 100 Labour MPs signed a private letter urging Gordon Brown to postpone plans to cut child benefit to lone parents.
"The scale of support, which includes half the party's back-benchers and reaches across both wings, will dismay the Government. Ministers had hoped the Chancellor's plans to pump £300 million into childcare and help single parents find jobs would satisfy those campaigning against the cuts.
"A significant number of Labour MPs signed an early day motion last week expressing concern about the benefit cuts...
"... News of the letter emerged yesterday just hours after Tony Blair slapped-down the veteran Labour left wingers, Diane Abbott and Ken Livingstone, for publicly airing grievances on donations to the party.
"The Prime Minister used a meeting of Labour's ruling body, the national executive committee, to make clear that MPs should voice their concerns about policies within the party, rather than broadcasting them in radio or television interviews...
From The St Petersburgh Times, Nov 24-30, 1997:
"MOSCOW - British Petroleum agreed to buy 10 percent of Sidanko and a 27 percent stake in a huge Siberian gas project for $571 million in a deal signed by BP CEO John Browne and Uneximbank President Vladimir Potanin at No. 10 Downing Street in London, in the presence of British Prime Minister Tony Blair.
"The sale marks a phenomenal return on investment for Uneximbank, which bought 96 percent of Sidanko for a mere $400 million during Russia's insider-dominated loans-for-shares auctions that began in 1995.
"Potanin has since admitted that those auctions - supervised by Anatoly Chubais, who was at that time President Boris Yeltsin's economics tsar - were rigged.
"Tuesday's partnership will give Uneximbank access to Western cash and technology to advance Sidanko's oil exploration and exploitation plans, while BP gains a Russian partner with clout for a market that has not often been kind to foreigners..."
From The Daily Telegraph, November 25, 1997:
"Tony Blair faces a confrontation with MPs from mining areas and trades unions over the Government's refusal to intervene to prevent pit closures which could cost 5,000 jobs...
"... One indication of the seriousness of the backlash is that the two MPs leading the protests, Paddy Tipping (Sherwood) and Michael Clapham (Barnsley West and Penistone), are both ministerial aides who are normally expected to show complete loyalty to the Government..."
From The Observer leader, November 23, 1997:
"The Blair Government is beginning to build an unenviable record. In trying to navigate a 'third way' with no certain compass, it is in danger of pleasing neither its friends nor appeasing its enemies ..."
From The News of the World, November 23, 1997:
"Premier Tony Blair will be accused this week in the Commons of murder.
"The alleged victim is Number 10 cat Humphrey, who was said to have been retired earlier this month to go to live in the country.
"But Mr Blair is to face demands to produce Humphrey or admit he is dead.
"Tory MP and News of the World columnist Alan Clark is tabling a series of questions. He said last night: 'Humphrey has got to appear in public. I'm sure he's been put down ...'"
From the News of the World, November 23, 1997:
"...I can reveal that Britain's first rock and roll PM is being wooed by the record industry to strap on his guitar and get back behind a microphone.
"How do I know? I heard it through the grapevine of course. The approach to Blair may well come through Cabinet Office minister Peter Kilfoyle, whose band the Hungry I's hung around with the Beatles in the sixties ...."
From The Sunday Telegraph, November 23, 1997:
"Jorg Haider, Europe's most influential Right-wing leader, is marketing himself as the Austrian Tony Blair in a campaign to stop his country rushing headlong into the single currency next year..."
From The Observer, November 23, 1997:
"Less than three weeks ago, Labour MPs were given an opportunity most of us only dream about. Tony Blair had come to the Commons to speak to them personally, away from the glare of the media and the public, prepared to answer any question on any subject they chose. But to the organisers' embarrassment, only six MPs out of more than 300 put up their hands to speak. The rest, apparently, were too awestruck for words..."
From The Observer, November 23, 1997:
"Sir Herbert Ouseley, chief executive of the Commission for Racial Equality, has threatened to quit over a planned budget cut, the Observer has learnt...
"...His departure would embarrass Tony Blair, who used his 'beacon of the world' speech at the Labour Party conference to promise to stamp out racial discrimination..."
From The Sunday Times, November 23, 1997:
"Irving [webmaster's note: Lord Chancellor] is a dangerous man to cross, as one Labour MP discovered. He made the mistake of risking a joke at Irvine's expense during a pre-election fundraising dinner..
"...Subsequently the MP has been blackballed from select committees. When he questioned the decision, he was told his name had personally been struck off lists by the Prime Minister. He is also being monitored by the Whips over his 'maverick' tendencies. 'Irvine's dislike of me very quickly turned into Blair's dislike,' said the MP.'Irvine has huge power and influence. His judgement is not questioned.'
"In government, Blair consults Irvine almost daily. The most political lord chancellor in modern times, Irvine is a member of eight of the 20 cabinet committees and chairs three of them. He is seen as one of the four people with the most influence on the prime minister: the others are Alastair Campbell, Peter Mandelson, and Gordon Brown...."
From The Sunday Times, November 23, 1997:
"An international fast food magnate gave the Labour Party £1m yesterday, replacing the cash that Tony Blair has promised to pay back to Bernie Ecclestone ...
"....Earl 46, lives in Orlando, Florida, but was born in north London and is a graduate of Surrey university. He therefore does not fall foul of Labour's foreign donors rule, which says that contributors must be eligible to vote in a British election..."
From The Sunday Times, November 23, 1997:
"Labour MPs reacted furiously yesterday after learning that spin doctors compiled a secret list of potential trouble-makers within hours of the party's election victory...."
From The Observer November 23, 1997:
"An angry Tony Blair has rounded on critics of his Government, accusing them of talking 'cynical rubbish', while acknowledging that spending on the public services needs to rise..."
From The Daily Mirror, November 22, 1997:
"Tony Blair was warned last night that plans to slash disabled benefit would cause misery.
"Angry charities said any cash cuts will hit Britain's most vulnerable.
"Royal National Institute for the Blind director Ian Bruce stormed:'This would be regarded as cast-iron proof Labour was not serious in its manifesto promises.'"
From The Financial Times, November 22, 1997:
"Mr Temple-Morris said Mr Hague's actions were 'quite over the top'. He retaliated by announcing he was quitting the Conservative party once and for all and would sit on Labour's benches as an 'independent One nation Conservative MP'. He said:'I am delighted to be able to support Tony Blair's efforts to build a new Britain.'
"...Tony Blair described Mr Temple-Morris as 'highly respected' and 'completely mainstream'. His expulsion by Mr Hague was 'quite extraordinary'."
From The Guardian, November 22, 1997:
"The Government has betrayed the health of the nation and needs to 'get back on track' over tobacco sponsorship of Formula One in order to prevent children being seduced into a fatal addiction, it was claimed yesterday by a coalition of 83 medical and welfare charities...
"...Sandy Macara, chairman of the British Medical Association, said Mr Blair had been 'conned' by the tobacco industry and Formula One chiefs and he should have the courage to admit he was wrong and change his mind...
"...Dr Macara added: 'The new report exposes the naivety of the Government's thinking, or the paucity of its thinking. It must stick to its original commitment to a total ban on tobacco advertising and sponsorship.'
"...'People have good reason to feel betrayed by the failure of New Labour to follow through on its election pledges. The Government has been conned silly by an unholy alliance of tobacco manufacturers and Formula One bosses, who have pedddled spurious arguments...'"
From The Independent, November 21, 1997:
"The cosiness of the relationship between the Prime Minister and the Queen, revealed in both their speeches, amounts to a mutually beneficial love-in..."
From The Independent, November 21, 1997:
"Tony Blair and John Major had so many free trips and junkets over the last year, as Leader of the Opposition and Prime Minister, that they both evidently feel it would be invidious to identify them. The Prime Minister's office said last night that Mr Blair had not registered a family visit to the Silverstone Grand Prix for the same reason Mr Major had not registered his numerous visits to Lord's or the Oval cricket grounds...
"...The register also contains one admission from the Prime Minister, who declares: 'Secondment of assistant to my Sedgefield constituency office by Barclays Bank, Newcastle, for one year, from 6 October 1997...."
From The Daily Telegraph, November 20, 1997:
"Labour has still not repaid Bernie Ecclestone's £1 million, despite being advised to do so more than a week ago, Tony Blair admitted in the Commons yesterday..."
From the Daily Telegraph, November 20, 1997:
"Tony Blair's Government is beginning to forfeit its reputation for political integrity, according to a new Gallup survey for the Daily Telegraph. Although most voters still trust the Government, the majority has fallen sharply over recent weeks..."
From The Chicago Tribune, November 18, 1997:
[webmaster's note - as a light break from Formula One, I have unusually reprinted this excellent article in full!]
CAT'S POLITICAL LIVES ARE USED UP
After having served 3 British prime ministers, Humphrey now is apparently feline non grata on Downing Street, reports the Tribune's Ray Moseley. Ray Moseley is the Chicago Tribune's chief European correspondent
Web-posted Tuesday, November 18, 1997; 6:07 a.m. CST
Dateline: LONDON
Humphrey, the world's second most celebrated cat, has been retired.
In eight years as the official government mouser at the prime minister's Downing Street residence, Humphrey has served under three of them, received telegrams from Socks in the White House and displayed a regal indifference to it all.
But Humphrey, named after the fictional Cabinet secretary Sir Humphrey Appleby in the television series "Yes, Prime Minister," apparently failed to build the political alliances necessary for survival in the rough-and-tumble world of Downing Street.
It has been clear for some time that his tenure was a troubled one, for he was more welcome at the heart of government under Conservative rule than he has been under New Labor.
When Tony Blair was elected prime minister last May, Cherie Blair made it known she considered cats "unhygienic" and was not exactly elated to have Humphrey on the premises.
That was too much for the British electorate. It had voted out John Major, not Humphrey. There was a public outcry, and the new prime minister's wife was forced to make amends by posing for photographs while cuddling Humphrey and pretending to enjoy it.
No one is saying Cherie Blair engineered Humphrey's ouster, but the fact is he is gone and she is still at Downing Street. Draw your own conclusions.
The official story is that Humphrey has moved to an undisclosed London suburb, away from the political tensions of Downing Street, to enjoy a quiet life with a member of the staff.
The official excuse, as is so frequently the case when a government wants to get rid ofan unwanted servant, is ill health.
Downing Street claims Humphrey's long-standing kidney complaint, believed to have resulted from his predilection for cookies at tea time, has worsened. It said he has become inactive and no longer takes any interest in food.
Nigel Evans, the Conservative shadow constitutional affairs minister, saw political significance in that.
After eight happy years under the Conservatives, he said, Humphrey had, in just six months under Labor, lost all interest in living.
Humphrey's retirement came during a week in which the government was wrestling with a highly embarrassing controversy over campaign contributions.
Some political reporters suggested Downing Street was attempting to divert attention from the uproar by putting the spotlight on the cat instead of the cash.
Humphrey, a black-and-white tomcat, came to Downing Street in 1989, when Margaret Thatcher was prime minister, as a stray and remained at his post during the seven years Major held the job.
Like any political operative, Humphrey had some bad moments, such as the time he was convicted of killing the queen's ducklings in St. James' Park or when he was suspected of having murdered four baby robins living in a nest just outside the prime minister's office.
He also was nearly run over by Bill Clinton's Cadillac.
While Major was in office, Humphrey disappeared for several months but was found living at the Royal Army Medical College, a half-mile away. Authorities speculated that he had climbed into a mail van and been delivered there unwittingly.
Two months after Labor came to power, he disappeared again. While suspicions might reasonably have pointed to Cherie Blair, the mystery was resolved three weeks later when a woman confessed to cat napping. She said she had spotted Humphrey in St. James' Park, mistook him for a stray and took him home.
Humphrey's final departure was unceremonious. The prime minister did not see him off, photographers were not invited to record the moment, and Cherie Blair made no comment.
Humphrey has so far maintained a dignified silence, and there was no word on whether Socks had any parting words for the Downing Street pensioner.
From Mary Riddell's column in The New Statesman, November 14, 1997:
"... so it seems we have one more instance of total obeisance - not unique to her [Tessa Jowell]- to the leader's wishes. And one more addition to a list of threadbare policies: a nicely packaged anti-hunting bill (but no chance of getting it through); an ethical arms strategy (but no plans to close any weapons factories).
"Implicit in all this window-dressing is a belief that substance is best subjugated to presentation. The smoking row - this week's bonfire of the vanities - is merely another example of how obsequious displays of party unity and half-baked bits of populist policy do not add up to a formula for a born-again Britain..."
From The House of Commons Hansard, November 17, 1997:
"Mrs. Teresa Gorman (Billericay): As my right hon. Friend the Member for Bridgwater (Mr. King) has just pointed out, between 1985 and about 1990 the culture of the times was such that many Members accepted hospitality from companies without declaring it. The practice was widespread. Indeed, our own Prime Minister has accepted hospitality at Gleneagles and a trip on Concorde, the Deputy Prime Minister ditto, and the President of the Board of Trade likewise. What is more, our Prime Minister recently accepted hospitality at Silverstone--yet none of that was declared in the Register of Members' Interests. Hamilton's was hardly a unique case; what he did was not unreasonable in the culture that prevailed at the time."
From The Daily Telegraph, November 18, 1997:
"Tony Blair's hopes of drawing a line under the Formula One furore were dashed last night when Tony Benn, the veteran Left-winger attacked 'cash for politics' and demanded far greater transparency over how Labour gets its funds.
"Mr Benn, a former Labour cabinet minister, did not directly mention the issue of Bernie Ecclestone's £1 million donation to the Government but he was clearly referring to it when he talked of 'cash for politics'.
"He said it raised serious questions of the standards of appropriate behaviour that should be accepted by the House. He complained that he did not know who his party's benefactors were.'As a member of the Labour Party I would like to know who gave money to the Labour Party, what they have given and when they gave it,' he said...."
From The Independent leader, November 17, 1997:
"...But what would Mr Blair have done differently, if he had been given the chance? He did not say. In his interview, his plea was that of the transgressor through the ages. Trust me. I know it looks bad, but I am not like those other men. 'I hope that people know me well enough and realise the type of person I am, to realise that I would never do anything to harm the country or anything improper. I never have.'
"This is the kind of plea that loses its currency over time, as each successive layer of innocence is stripped away, and the love affair loses its magic."
From Andrew Rawnsley's column in The Observer, 16 November, 1997:
"... Mr Blair seems to believe that tycoons give cash to the Tories in order to buy influence and honours, but they shower him with dosh because he is such a wonderful human being.."
From The Sunday Telegraph, November 16, 1997:
"When Alan Langlands, head of the National Health Service Executive recently wrote to the chief executives of health authorities and hospital trusts, warning them that their computer systems might crash thanks to the so-called 'millenium bug', he rubbed home the urgency of the point by suggesting that in extreme cases this could create a threat to human life...
"... But when officials of the Department of Health issued his letter as a press release, Computer Weekly's Tony Collins has revealed, all references to the life-threatening risk of the '2000 bug' were censored out...
"Last Tuesday 'millenium project managers' from several top companies, including BT, Shell, Reuters and Nationwide, spent two hours at Downing Street pleading with the Prime Minister's advisers to recognise the seriousness of the crisis the country faces...
"But it seems our switched-on Prime Minister is far too preoccupied with telling the world about his plans to create a 'cool, modern New Britain' to worry about something as old-fashioned as computers."
From Jeremy Hardy's column in The Guardian, November 15, 1997:
"Many rich people have switched their allegiance to Labour because Labour has switched its allegiance to them. Tony Blair is bound to elevate people he likes and admires, and most of the people he likes and admires seem to be rich. He is influenced by people he invites to parties, and since he doesn't much like trade unionists, they don't get invited. I suspect that Formula One boss Bernie Ecclestone's political influence has more to do with Blair's craven wish to please big business than it has to do with political donations...."
The European, 13-19 November, 1997:
"Prime Minister Tony Blair, Europe's self-proclaimed Mr Clean, was embarrassed into returning his party's biggest-ever political donation for fear its acceptance could be construed as bribery in exchange for his veto on including Formula One in a European ban on tobacco advertising in sport..."
From The Times, November 13, 1997:
"Tony Blair has failed to declare that he received free tickets to last year's British Grand Prix from a leading figure in Formula One racing.
"The Prime Minister and his wife, Cherie, were guests at Silverstone of Max Mosley, the president of the Fédération Internationale de Automobile (FIA), who is at the centre of the controversy over the tobacco advertising ban.
"Senior party sources last night denied that there was any obligation on Mr Blair to register the interest because he had gone in his capacity as Leader of the Opposition...
" ... The decision by Mr Blair not to declare the hospitality in the Register of MPs' interests is in contrast to Geoffrey Robinson, the Paymaster General, who loaned the Prime Minister his Tuscan villa during the summer holiday.
"Mr Robinson accepted an invitation to attend the grand prix, from Philip Morris, the cigarette manufacturers, along with members of his family. He was unable to make it but his family went instead.
"Mr Robinson took no chances in the register and wrote: 'Members of my family attended the 1996 Grand Prix at Silverstone as guests of Philip Morris.'..."
From The Daily Telegraph, November 11, 1997:
"Tony Blair sought to head off accusations of Labour sleaze by returning a substantial donation to party funds from Bernie Ecclestone, vice-president of the Formula One Association.
"The amount of the donation, given before the general election, was not disclosed. But the sum, thought to have been around £1 million, would have been registered in the party's accounts next year..."
From Peter Riddell's collumn in The Times, November 11, 1997:
"The long predicted demise of the Cabinet as a central organ of government has finally occurred. Cabinet Ministers still matter as heads of departments, but their Thursday meetings are no longer of real importance. Most decisions have for a long time been taken by committees or by small ad hoc groups. But, under Tony Blair, the full Cabinet has lost even its residual role as a court of appeal or as a forum for discussing big issues. We have moved from a collective to a centralised system directed by 10 Downing Street..."
From The Guardian leader, November 11, 1997:
"So maybe this is what Tony Blair meant by the Giving Age: you give us the money, we'll give you the policy. Sounds harsh, but the latest revelations about motor racing, cigarettes and the Government make it hard to draw any other conclusion. Big-money donors were able not only to get a face-to-face meeting with the Prime Minister, but also to talk him into reversing a signature government decision. If this had happened in the last days of the Major era we know what we would have called it:sleaze ..."
From Harry Enfield's column in the Sunday Telegraph, November 9, 1997:
"A minute later Mr Blair came back.'Have I been ranting at you in a drunken fashion?' I hiccuped. The Prime Minister gave me a very Tony Blair-type answer. 'Honestly,' he replied, 'people often forget I'm not just the man you see standing at the dispatch box.'
He seemed to reassure me without answering the question whatsoever..."
From The Sunday Telegraph, November 9, 1997:
"Tony Blair gave up smoking at precisely 1.45pm on the day in March 1980 that he married Cherie Booth.'It was my wife's idea.' he recalled much later, 'one of the terms of the contract.' By coincidence - or perhaps not - he now leads what appears to be the first non-smoking Cabinet, if one discounts the occasional cigar enjoyed by Jack Straw and Nick Brown...
"...True to its taste for novelty, New Labour has in fact developed a new kind of U-turn - more accurately described as an "S-turn". In this manoevre, a policy is adopted, ditched, and then, usually after intense lobbying, adoped once again ..."
From The Observer, November 9, 1997:
"Max Mosley, who heads the body which talked the Government into exempting Formula One from its anti-smoking policy, is a prominent Labour supporter who has given thousands of pounds to party funds..."
From The News of the World, November 9, 1997:
"Angry Tony Blair clashed furiously with his backbenchers - accusing one of talking 'drivel'...
"Mr Blair slapped down backbencher Paul Flynn when he accused Labour of backtracking on a promise on pensions. Mr Flynn is angry they are to be uprated in line with inflation, not earnings which rise faster - a move signalled before the election.
"Mr Blair snapped:'We have heard that sort of drivel from you before.'
"An enraged Mr Flynn hit back: 'You talk about hard choices. But we are hard on basic pensions and soft on fox hunters.'"
From The Independent, November 8, 1997:
"The Government will for the first time enshrine the right to smack in law. The news that Tony Blair 'fully supported' ministers' decision to preserve the right of parents to smack children was greeted with dismay last night by those committed to ending all physical disciplining...
"...Observers believe the Government has backed the right to smack because it was worried about how a total ban would play among right-wing newspapers and 'pro-family' groups. Mr Blair has admitted smacking his children - though confessed he later regretted it..."
From The Guardian, November 7, 1997:
"The Prime Minister's hitherto elusive Attorney General, John Morris, has to decide by Monday whether to plunge his government into a controversial official secrets trial, by consenting to the prosecution of the former intelligence officer, Richard Tomlinson, charged with passing information to an Australian Publisher.
"Embarrasingly, the section of the toughened-up 1989 Secrets Act in question is one which Morris and Tony Blair, along with the present Foreign Secretary, Robin Cook, and Home Secretary Jack Straw, had previously voted against....
"...The draconian nature of section 1 was the main reason why Labour opposed the act when it was rushed through the Commons by the Thatcher administration in the wake of the Spycatcher affair. Morris, Blair, Cook and Straw voted against its second reading in December 1988...."
From the leader in The Independent, November 6, 1997:
"Labour's manifesto was clear. 'Smoking is the greatest single cause of preventable illness and premature death in the UK. We will therefore ban tobacco advertising.' Up goes that most familiar political cry: U-turn!
"...What is more important than any of Labour's broken promises or disappointed expectations to date is whether or not the Government delivers on the central planks of its manifesto. Mr Blair's five key pledges have all collided with reality. The Government won't even start trying to cut infant class sizes until next year, and it is still not obvious how it will be done. The same applies to faster sentencing for young offenders. But the really tough one is going to be cutting NHS waiting lists; since the election, they have risen steeply...
From The Independent, November 6, 1997:
"Formula One racing was exempted from a tobacco sponsorship ban after lobbying by a former aide to John Smith, the Labour leader who died in 1994. Fran Abrams and Katherine Butler reveal that Tony Blair met motor racing's top officials after representations from David Ward, who now works for the sport's governing body
"The Prime Minister had "numerous" meetings with leading Formula One officials, Mr Ward said last night...
From The Guardian, November 6, 1997:
"Labour MPs yesterday challenged Tony Blair over fox hunting, social security payments and student fees, in the first signs of backbench discontent over the Government's performance....
From Francis Wheen's column in The Guardian, November 5, 1997:
"Tony Blair has an alarming habit of jumping on to bandwagons just as their wheels are falling off. He picked Noel Gallagher as the embodiment of New labour at the very moment when the limitations of Oasis were finally exposed by Be Here Now, the most tedious and overblown album of the year; and he became an eager convert ro Thatcherite neo-liberalism - with its twin deities of deregulation and free markets - when everyone else was heartily sick of it...
"...This warning [referring to Soros] echoes a prescient article written by a Labour MP for the London Review of Books, exactly 10 years ago, before his party acquired its starry-eyed faith in the magic of the markets....'There is a tremendous danger to which Dr Owen has succumbed in believing that "Thatcherism" is somehow now invincible, that it has established a new concensus...The nineties will not see the continuing triumph of the market, but its failure'.
"The author of this prediction was the party's trade and industry spokesman, Tony Blair ....
From The Scotsman, 4 November, 1997:
"Tony Blair's failure to address demands for greater regional government in England is stoking up a damaging backlash against plans for a parliament in Edinburgh, a senior academic at a Scottish university will warn tomorrow.
"Professor John Mawson will argue that the decision to back-pedal on proposals to strengthen accountability in the English regions presents serious problems for Scottish devolution and will produce fresh demands for Scotland's generous share of public spending to be squeezed...
From The Sun, November 4, 1997:
"Top-level Downing Street meetings are being disrupted by the strains of Tony Blair's eldest son doing his piano practice.
"Senior Ministers are treated to impromptu recitals by 13-year-old Euan, whose playing can be clearly heard through the walls of No. 10.
"One minister said last night: 'You can be halfway through an early morning meeting when all you hear is a piano.'....
From The Sunday Times (Michael Jones' column), November 2, 1997:
"I am glad to hear Tony Blair has mended fences with James Callaghan. Downing Street insiders say he met Labour's last prime minister for a long talk at No. 10 during the summer and that Callaghan has been a recent guest at one of Blair's receptions.
"Blair was quicker off the mark in seeking Margaret Thatcher's views after the elction. She was invited across her old threshold within weeks of Labour's May 1 victory, some say in gratitude for her covert support for the man she said privately would never let Britain down.
"Callaghan, barely mentioned in Blair's speech at Brighton, has taken a sniffy view of his era being written out of the party's history. Kenneth Morgan, whose official biography of Callaghan was recently published, noted that it was if figures such as Harold Wilson and Callaghan no longer belonged to "Labour's usable past". Blair told Callaghan at Francois Mitterand's state funeral last year that he had never even met Wilson. No wonder the old man has been startled by the way old Labour has been dumped."
From an article by Tony Blair in The Guardian, November 3, 1997:
"...We were elected on May 1, determined to modernise Britain and restore faith in politics...
"...There will be zero-tolerance of failure: there is no room for poor performance, whether it is in our schools, childrens' homes, or collecting rubbish...
"I have vowed to clean up politics: there is no room for sleaze in the new Britain....
"When elected, I pledged I would modernise the country and bring government back to the people. A reborn and reenergised local government serving the people is at the very heart of this pledge."
From The Sunday Times, November 2, 1997:
"For the Today programme on Radio 4, it has been a rude awakening: Tony Blair does not listen to the show, and his media strategists prefer GMTV breakfast television for selling policies to the nation..."
From The Independent on Sunday (Alan Watkins' Column), November 2, 1997:
"....This is not power worship on my part. On the contrary: it is precisely because I believe that the exercise of power should be rigorously scrutinised and closely controlled that I regard the concentration on the misfortunes of the Conservative Party as unhealthy. Irrespective of whether we are observing the Tories with grief or delight, Mr Blair and Mr Gordon Brown are manifestly laughing all the way to Brussels and back. They remind me rather of the two little dickie-birds who were sitting on the wall. They were called, not Tony and Gordon, but Peter and Paul:"Fly away Peter, fly away Paul./Come back Peter, come back Paul.""
From the Guardian, November 1, 1997:
"....So how does this old Labour man [Tony Booth] feel about his son-in-law's first six months as Prime Minister?
"'Well.' He pauses, thinks and smiles.''He would say this wouldn't he?' Tony is an exceptional guy who was destined to do exceptional things. To bring a fair form of justice and a just and fair society. He's genuine. He's upfront. The things he has done have been fantastic....'