A not unexpectedly weighty tome this, and in some parts, especially the overlong treatises on foreign policy, not the easiest of reads, but not as dry as one might have expected. Written in a conversational style, Blair comes across as a man with a sharp mind, but without intellectual baggage, pseudo or otherwise. In fact he maybe tries too hard to come across as the Ordinary Bloke he plainly is not.
It is nigh on impossible to write a review of a political autobiography objectively as the reviewer inevitably brings his or her own political bias to the table, however I'll try. Taking the book as a series of themes, this is my take...
New Labour
Blair was elected to Parliament when Labour was under the ideologically pure but hopeless leadership of Michael Foot, and Blair obviously has affection for Foot, but not for his party's then hidebound and completely out of touch policies. Blair sees the modernisation of the Labour Party as essential to making them electable and he's probably right, but he fails to see that his taking Labour to the centre and thereby pulling the Conservatives in the same direction has contributed in no small part to the general population's political apathy.
It is repeated many times in the latter parts of the book that in Blair's opinion if Brown was to deviate an inch from New Labour's tenet of introducing the free market into public services as a means of modernisation then they would lose to the Tories. I disagree completely with that idea. As one of thousands of disaffected Labour voters I voted Lib Dem in 2010 (God help me) purely because Gordon Brown was not and never would be Prime Minister material, not because he disagreed with Blair's version of modernisation.
Blair can be justifiably proud of dragging the Welfare State into the modern age which was the fulcrum of New Labour thinking, but I'm afraid for me New Labour remains a compromise, not a vision.
Gordon Brown
The relationship is described in minute detail and Blair goes to great lengths to describe Brown's treachery in daring to disagree with what some might see as Blair's Conservative tendencies where private capital is concerned, disguised as progressivism, but he does it in a manner that places the blame on GB's team, not on the man himself. He distills the ongoing and understandable resentment on Brown's part for Blair not handing over when initially promised by stating that he would only go if GB promised to continue New Labour's (read Blair's) reform program, something Brown was increasingly reluctant to do. Indeed why should he have given a promise to effectively put his own ideas on the back burner?
However, Blair goes out of his way to praise Brown's numerous contributions and talents on more than a few occasions, so it's obvious Blair still has affection for his old friend. It will be interesting to read Brown's take on the breakdown of the relationship, should he ever write it.
War & Peace
We've all got our opinions on the rights and wrongs of the Iraq war, and no amount of justification by Blair is going to change my view that the conflict was plainly wrong. Blair ultimately justifies the conflict by way of stating that if we hadn't removed Saddam when we did, he would have had to be removed at some later point anyway.
Firstly I thought that the reason for the war was Saddam's capacity to make and deploy WMDs? Secondly, why would "we" have had to remove him at a later point? I would have thought the first countries to be involved in any extraction would be Iraq's Arab neighbours, should the need arise.
Blair makes the point that Great Britain as a nation has a prominent role to play in world politics as a direct result of his ensuring our involvement in Kosovo, Afghanistan, Iraq etc. I think most folk in our tiny nation stuck here on the edge of Europe do not share our leaders' (of whatever political persuasion) obsession with clinging on to some vestige of long forgotten (by the population at least) Imperial power. The billions to be spent on renewing Trident, a symbol more than a useful military tool, and a decision Blair almost said no to but didn't have the balls, would be far better spent on incentivising the economy to ease the lot of the burgeoning jobless total.
It is plain that Blair does carry the weight of those who died in the various conflicts he had us involved in, and he is deeply sorry for the fact, but there remains no doubt in his mind he made the right decision where Iraq was concerned.
I don't suppose we should have expected anything different on that front.
The achievement that New Labour and Blair should rightly be applauded for and the achievement that should have been Blair's legacy was getting the Northern Ireland peace agreement finalised and working against seemingly impossible odds. Mo Mowlem is portrayed as being only peripheral to the triumph, as Blair clearly views it as his legacy. If he can pull off a similar feat in his new role as Middle East Envoy with the Israeli/Palestinian conflict then Iraq may be forgiven.
The media
Blair started out as the media darling, spun them into at first annoyance and later downright hostility, and ended by being hunted at every turn.
Complaining that the media tried to bury him and and New Labour in the sleaze storm over cash for honours and the comical sideline of gravity's effects on Prescott's trousers when in the presence of his diary secretary, Blair says being hounded out that way would have been "reputationally ghastly".
I consider complaining about the media having wound them round his pinky for so long is somewhat disingenuous.
Regrets
A few, but too few to mention. Oh, alright then...he regrets the Fox Hunting legislation, and the Freedom Of Information Act. The former shows he's out of touch with majority opinion and the latter shows contempt for that same majority.
In conclusion, this book will not alter what most folk see as defining Blair - The Iraq War, and entrenched opinions will not change. I've come out of reading this with more respect for the man, but I don't like him now any more than before, but that's probably how he would want it.
