Goodwill can be salvaged – if lessons are learnt
Daily Telegraph, January 29th 2004

Pity the Prime Minister. That might seem a strange sentiment in this week of all weeks. After all, he survived the tuition fees vote by the skin of his teeth and he will regard Lord Hutton's findings as complete vindication.

And yet many of the questions that have hung over his very personal style of government remain unanswered. Given everything he has been through, how much longer does he really want to stay in the job?

Just as important, what exactly do we expect from our senior politicians in this frenetic modern world? Who on earth would want it?

Blair is, in many regards, the author of his own misfortune. He decided from the moment he took over as Labour leader a long 10 years ago that he would mould his party in his own image. The more power beckoned, the more Blair's personality subsumed his party.

In his first term, he barely consulted his Cabinet on any major issue of the day. In his second term, he took us to war very much on his own. It was not just Jack Straw, the Foreign Secretary, who expressed doubts about the war in his confidential last-minute memo to Blair. Privately, many other Cabinet ministers had their misgivings. But this was Blair's war, as this has been very much Blair's Government.

And it has taken its toll. The man who seemed to embody that optimistic, perhaps naïve, pre-millennium moment now looks his 50 years. Perhaps it was all a bit too good to be true, but in this gloomier, post-September 11 world Blair has substituted the dashing for the dogged.

Only he, his family and his doctors know the true state of his health. Those who see him regularly insist that he is as fit as a fiddle, and dismiss the talk of his heart condition as exaggerated.

No matter what he seems to go through, Blair's self-belief is astonishing.

His approach to the war was a combination of hubris, naïvety but also good intentions. He assured President George W Bush that he could persuade the rest of the world to back a second resolution. He believed he could convince his own party to back him.

He simply cannot understand how so many people cast doubt on his trustworthiness. He will regard Hutton's findings on that score as absolute acquittal. He will hope the worst is behind him.

Blair knows that he has not achieved much of what he wanted to achieve, and is determined to accelerate the process of change in his remaining months or years in Downing Street.

Once again it comes down to the first person singular. He believes that, without his personal drive, little would get done.

That may have been the case in the past, in those days of hyper-control and dominance, but that is unlikely to be the case in the future.

Blair is now beholden to his party and in particular to Gordon Brown. It was the Chancellor of the Exchequer who saved the Prime Minister in Tuesday night's dramatic vote, just as he did on the vote on the eve of war last March, and in the vote on foundation hospitals last autumn.

Put simply, Blair cannot continue to govern the way he has. Cabinet government will have to be strengthened. Formal government procedures must be observed. Parliament must be restored to its rightful place.

The Prime Minister should not seek praise, or be forced to take the blame, for every decision that is taken.

Paradoxically, this Government can feel proudest for a number of small, incremental, measures that have not received huge publicity – the minimum wage, the sure start programme to get people into work, low unemployment, low inflation, low interest rates and generally withstanding the global economic downturn.

Blair and his people have always resented the way they feel these achievements have been "banked" – by their MPs, activists, journalists and the public at large – while the many problems have been trawled over and dissected.

It is when Blair and his spin doctors have resorted to hype and macho "leadership'' rhetoric that he has stumbled and fallen.

Blair has survived a difficult week. As he surveys the scene between now and the next general election, due probably in May or June 2005, he needs to revive not just his authority but the public's trust in him.

For that to happen, he will need to change his ways, to accept what he knows and what he does not, to acknowledge what he can do and what he cannot.

Candour and contrition are not just good in themselves; they are politically advisable. He should begin by giving a much fuller account of the intelligence on weapons of mass destruction that he cited posed a "real and current" threat to Britain and was the main reason for sending British troops into battle.

Now that Hutton has cleared the Prime Minister of lying, the only other explanation for the non-existence of WMD must be an error of judgment. No matter what retrospective reasons are given, to take your country to war on the basis of a blunder is not something to be skated over.

Blair needs to address this point urgently. A more open approach generally could reduce the number of scrapes he gets into in the future. The past year has been particularly dispiriting for Blair and the country. Who would want to be him? Who would have chosen to face so many crises in such a short period?

For those who saw in him - back in those heady days of 1997 - a youthful optimism are wiser now. Much of the goodwill has gone, but there is still some to be salvaged, if the appropriate lessons are learnt.


This article first appeared in the Daily Telegraph and may not be reproduced without permission.