While we were getting a mite excited about a diminutive Frenchman holidaying outside, or off our beautiful shoreline this week, Europe’s biggest politician, Tony Blair has indicated his intention to step down as leader of the labour Party on 27 June. It is as much the end of an era as the end of Thatcherism was, and though Blair like Thatcher rose to the dizziest of heights only to plummet to hellish lows, he is still arguably one of the great post war European premiers, whatever you think about his views on his too close relationship with George Bush in general, and his apparently blind support for the Iraq war in particular.
While I remember the Labour Party crowing with delight when Thatcher left, the same cannot be said of the Tory reaction to Tony Blair’s departure on Thursday. Cameron, the new Tory leader said he found it difficult to attack him because they agreed on so much, and when they didn’t Tony Blair tended to have more right wing views than Cameron! The Lib Dems on the other hand, rather churlishly in my view, chose to give Tony Blair a four out of 10 for his performance, but history will probably adjust that upwards. I have lived in Malta for almost all of Tony Blair’s premiership but, having previously experienced the 1980s recession, you cannot fail to point out how much most of Britain, but particularly the South East, has boomed economically for almost the whole of that time. It is quite a tremendous legacy and one many of his counterparts in Europe envy.
Yet when most of us remember Tony Blair only one word will spring to mind.
Iraq.
Whether he was right or not to invade Iraq will be argued about endlessly and judged by historians ultimately, but he certainly didn’t seem like a Bush loving warmonger when he was first elected to office. The start of his premiership coincided with the untimely death of Diana, Princess of Wales, and from that point his mastery of the media was clear. While the Queen and her stuffy entourage went into navel gazing anally retentive mode, he seized the opportunity to capitalise on a new element of Britishness, showing your emotions and not being afraid to do so. A huge chunk of British people loved the drama surrounding Diana, loved her beauty, loved all the emotion she generated and Blair read her as the people’s princess and in a sense secured his own place as one of Britain’s most powerful icons of the 1990s
Post Diana, the era of the stiff British upper lip was over and Blair very, very successfully played on all our emotions for 10 years. He only really ever got it wrong on Iraq. He seemed to acknowledge, not that he got it wrong, but that much of the British public (and of course most of the rest of the world) viewed his decisions he took there as the wrong one. In a brilliantly exercised speech to his constituents on Thursday, he reminded them all, and us, that he thought all along that he was doing the right thing. And we tend to forget that the British voted him in again a couple of years ago, even after much of the disaster that is the Iraq war had already become self evident. In fact it was the media that almost hounded him out, demanding to know when exactly he would leave since he said he would not contest another election, a timely lesson to anyone perhaps, who hands the media any information on a plate.
The only blot in his resignation speech to his constituents was calling the British the greatest nation on earth. It is exactly that kind of xenophobic stupidity that has not only made many English people turn against Blair, but also sadly made many Europeans, young Europeans particularly, turn not only anti American, but also anti British too. The British may have once thought they were better than anyone else, but the post war generation and their children that I got to know and love during my 15 years in the UK didn’t come out and say it.
At least I never heard it from anyone except the mad lunatics of the far, far right. Tony Blair stoked silly nationalism trying to
justify the war in Iraq, and sadly proceeded to destroy not only his own reputation, but also the hitherto good reputation of the British overseas.
To us Maltese his leaving early must seem strange. Very few resign here before they are booted out of office, premiers particularly. And especially after what we regard as not so long a period in office – 10 years. Here, many Nationalists are trying to come to terms with the slowly dawning, possible reality that after practically 20 unbroken years in office it may be time to switch sides. In every country it is as natural as night following day, but here, because one party has remained in office for an unnaturally long time change itself almost seems unnatural to many, and very many are still undecided, a point which comes out again in all the surveys in The Times, MaltaToday and on Xarabank too. The trends are there but the unsure and the no voters are growing by the day, which explains why pro Labour writers like Desmond Zammit Marmara keep reminding their supporters not to count their chickens before they are hatched.
France is now moving further to the right. What will Britain do? Will it continue Blair’s legacy via Gordon Brown or will it try Cameron’s “metrosexual” approach? Will England go for a rough, jaw dominated Scotsman or a man like Cameron who, Diana-like, is not afraid to show his touchy feely side? Gordon Brown has experience on his side and now the opportunity to show he is his own man. But Labour have been there for a long time and the pendulum may swing to the right again.
Somehow though, I do not think either Brown or Cameron will be a patch on Blair. This Prime Minister defined the transition to the new century as much as Thatcherism dominated the eighties. He gave a new meaning to what Labour or leftiness could mean as much as the daughter of a shopkeeper, Margaret Thatcher, redefined conservatism. England has been lucky to have produced two great and very memorable politicians in the space of only 30 years, politicians who not only dominated their own country’s political landscape, but have also been, whether you agreed with them or not, among the most influential in Europe and the world. Blair and Thatcher have exercised an influence that is way beyond the actual importance of the UK’s economy today.
And that is ultimately how history will remember them. Thatcher and Blair will be remembered. Brown, Major, Cameron, Hague, Ashdown et al will be like ships that passed in the night. Blair is now part of our memory of Britain. Modern Britain is part of Blairism too. Whether Blair redefined Britain or whether Blair was the product of the new Britain can be discussed at length. Ultimately though, the two are now inseparable. Blair’s will be an unforgettable legacy, whether you agreed with all his policies or not. And remember, ultimately politicians do just want that… to be remembered.
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