Why Tony Blair wears that look of virtuous but irritable bafflement
The Prime Minister has long felt an unshakeable conviction that he brings to bear a unique insight into human affairs. There are great schemes to transform society and make a better world which he would undoubtedly accomplish if only circumstances allowed. Sadly they do not. A number of factors — dim-witted ministerial colleagues, unco-operative Labour MPs, an incompetent Civil Service, the mulishness of Gordon Brown and a cynical press and broadcasting media are probably the five which loom largest in the Prime Minister’s mind — have prevented him from carrying them out. Hence the look of virtuous though irritable bafflement that has gradually become Tony Blair’s most characteristic public expression.
The Prime Minister combines victim status with an irrational cheerfulness. This profoundly dotty air of martyrdom accounts for the overwhelming sense of unreality that has begun to emerge from Downing Street as Tony Blair embarks on his final years, or just as likely months, in office.
Nobody really cares any more. Three months have now elapsed since the position of Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster, a Cabinet post, became vacant. In the normal course of events it would be a reasonably pressing matter to find a replacement. But Downing Street aides say that Tony Blair ‘can’t be bothered’ to carry out the necessary reshuffle, as if that were an explanation. The casualness was on display when Mr Blair didn’t bother to turn up and vote on his Religious Hatred Bill two weeks ago. There was no real remorse afterwards. It was just one of those things.
As he reaches the end of a long premiership, Tony Blair has come to feel an extreme sense of detachment. He conducts himself less like the powerful centre of a dynamic government than a disinterested though still curious observer. Last week saw two important political moments — a negotiated settlement between the government and at least some of the Labour rebels over education reform, and the public emergence of a dramatic new configuration in the balance of power between Tony Blair and Gordon Brown. Both of the developments are unexpected and, on the face of things, unaccountable. Both are manifestations of the curious psychology now at work inside Downing Street. The agreement between rebel MPs and Downing Street is the most difficult to explain. In the foreword to last autumn’s White Paper, Tony Blair wrote that he proposed a ‘radical’ extension to the freedoms enjoyed by schools. He asserted that Britain was at a ‘historic turning point’. Crucial to this transformation, so the Prime Minister maintained, was creating independence for schools. This meant taking them out of bureaucratic control. ‘To underpin this change,’ he insisted, ‘the local authority must move from being a provider of education to being its local commissioner and the champion of parent choice.’ This was raising the stakes very high indeed.
On Monday the Education Secretary, Ruth Kelly, seemed to indicate that the government had given way on this absolutely central point. This concession was enough to cause the leaders of the Labour rebels to call it a day. Mystifyingly, Tony Blair continued to maintain that his laudable and ambitious programme of reform was still on course. Sitting in front of the Commons liaison committee on Tuesday morning, he told MPs that his plan was ‘intact’. So it is impossible to say whether the Prime Minister has given in or not. Two contradictory versions of events are in circulation. Publicly, the Prime Minister insists that he has not been diverted from the bold, radical path. Privately, ministers assure Labour MPs that they have got what they want. There is a remote possibility that the Education Bill itself, due to be published next Thursday, will bring clarity. There again, it may not.
The second notable phenomenon was Gordon Brown. The Chancellor, after a very long period of silence, has moved up several notches. He now conducts himself as if he were prime minister and not a finance minister. His speech on constitutional affairs two weeks ago was followed by a venture into foreign policy, which I am told will be repeated. On Tuesday he dropped some remarks following the conviction of Abu Hamza, a direct incursion into the territory of the Home Secretary.
Until very recently indeed, this kind of muscle-flexing by the Chancellor would have met with an icy response from No. 10. This time the Chancellor’s comments were met with blithe unconcern, a sure indication that a new arrangement has been reached. Gordon Brown surrounds himself with a screen of senior advisers such as the Treasury official John Kingman, who is expected to accompany him to Downing Street in due course. Soon the Chancellor will doubtless embark on the series of nationwide tours he promised at last year’s Labour conference. These threaten to be regal affairs, the kind of thing King George VI and Queen Elizabeth embarked on when the modern monarchy was in its prime in the middle of the last century. In an interview with the Daily Mirror this week the Chancellor pledged yet more reform when he becomes prime minister, though he did not try to explain what kind of reform he had in mind, merely that there would be a lot of it. He has vouchsafed the fact that he rises at 5 a.m. to set to work. The information is reassuring, but once again it is not wholly clear to what purpose all this hard work is dedicated and what he actually does during those extra hours at his Treasury desk.
Downing Street aides now hint that various themes — the exit from Iraq, the beddingdown of public service reform, the culmination of ten years in office — will coalesce to create propitious conditions for some kind of witching hour in the summer of next year. They encourage the notion that an understanding with the Chancellor has been reached. At first I was highly suspicious of this talk. So often in the past Tony Blair has fended off trouble by giving out to Gordon Brown that he is due to depart at a given date, only to find an excuse to change his mind. But now I wonder. There is a new niceness and decency in Downing Street which is fundamentally alarming. Recent weekend visitors to Chequers say that Tony Blair has never appeared happier or more relaxed. Reportedly the Prime Minister is in excellent physical shape and feels confident that he is on course to deliver the kind of radical reform he has always promised. Be that as it may, this is certainly a strange time at Westminster.
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