Blair & Brown: The New Labour Revolution

Just finished watching the series and was a very interesting documentary.

Just a few musings on it, along with my own recollection of events at the time having been born in 1977 and soon to head to uni for a degree in Politics.

Firstly, Blair and Brown were immense for the Labour Party at that time. The modernisation was needed and the combination of Brown's excellent grasp of politics along with the charisma and charm of Blair took Labour to a whole new level in connecting with the whole country.

The early years were by and large very successful - tax credits, minimum wage, starting to invest in schools and the NHS and perhaps the biggest success of all was pulling off the impossible- the Good Friday agreement.

I realise this won't be a popular opinion but even as an anti-war socialist LP member I actually warmed slightly to Tony Blair during the series. I felt he acknowledged mistakes were made and I thought the deep regret and sorrow of the wrong decisions around Iraq were evident in his eyes and demeanour.

Iraq will always be a huge burden for him to carry and has destroyed him politically and yet when that is taken out of the equation he is without doubt the best leader this country has had during my lifetime. George Osborne summed it up when he called him a one man Tory wrecking machine.

Gordon Brown is someone I particularly feel for - he took over as PM just we headed into a perfect storm of political and economic disasters for which he and the Labour Party unfortunately took the blame when the Tory and media spin machines got into full flow.

The fact of the matter is that Gordom Brown was central to stopping an even greater economic disaster happening during the banking crisis. Had things gone differently I feel he would and could have been an excellent PM.

Finally, I found Peter Mendelson intriguing during the series. He's someone I've not really had a lot of time for as he brings too much baggage with him yet there is no doubt he was the real architect of new Labour and the success that initially brought. He evidently has a very, very sharp political mind and at one point he appeared to get quite emotional at being sacked over the passports affair (for which he was ultimately cleared of any wrongdoing).

I don't agree with it but I can see why he has supposedly been brought in behind the scenes to help Keir Starmer. He's a canny operator.

I also thought Ed Balls came across very well and whilst I don't think Alistair Campbell is a particularly likeable person it's plain to see why he was also a key figure in the party.

What sadly is evident is that there were a lot of excellent MPs within the party at that point across the political spectrum, and the Labour Party of today is sadly a million miles away from having the same level of talent as back then. I only hope this changes ASAP as the even more talentless Tories are causing absolute carnage to the UK.
 
WeeGord said:
Just finished watching the series and was a very interesting documentary.

Just a few musings on it, along with my own recollection of events at the time having been born in 1977 and soon to head to uni for a degree in Politics.

Firstly, Blair and Brown were immense for the Labour Party at that time. The modernisation was needed and the combination of Brown's excellent grasp of politics along with the charisma and charm of Blair took Labour to a whole new level in connecting with the whole country.

The early years were by and large very successful - tax credits, minimum wage, starting to invest in schools and the NHS and perhaps the biggest success of all was pulling off the impossible- the Good Friday agreement.

I realise this won't be a popular opinion but even as an anti-war socialist LP member I actually warmed slightly to Tony Blair during the series. I felt he acknowledged mistakes were made and I thought the deep regret and sorrow of the wrong decisions around Iraq were evident in his eyes and demeanour.

Iraq will always be a huge burden for him to carry and has destroyed him politically and yet when that is taken out of the equation he is without doubt the best leader this country has had during my lifetime. George Osborne summed it up when he called him a one man Tory wrecking machine.

Gordon Brown is someone I particularly feel for - he took over as PM just we headed into a perfect storm of political and economic disasters for which he and the Labour Party unfortunately took the blame when the Tory and media spin machines got into full flow.

The fact of the matter is that Gordom Brown was central to stopping an even greater economic disaster happening during the banking crisis. Had things gone differently I feel he would and could have been an excellent PM.

Finally, I found Peter Mendelson intriguing during the series. He's someone I've not really had a lot of time for as he brings too much baggage with him yet there is no doubt he was the real architect of new Labour and the success that initially brought. He evidently has a very, very sharp political mind and at one point he appeared to get quite emotional at being sacked over the passports affair (for which he was ultimately cleared of any wrongdoing).

I don't agree with it but I can see why he has supposedly been brought in behind the scenes to help Keir Starmer. He's a canny operator.

I also thought Ed Balls came across very well and whilst I don't think Alistair Campbell is a particularly likeable person it's plain to see why he was also a key figure in the party.

What sadly is evident is that there were a lot of excellent MPs within the party at that point across the political spectrum, and the Labour Party of today is sadly a million miles away from having the same level of talent as back then. I only hope this changes ASAP as the even more talentless Tories are causing absolute carnage to the UK.
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Superb summary. 👍
Although I disagree about Alastair Campbell. I think it was his job to be dislikable. He now writes some superb stuff about, and is an excellent ambassador for mental illness and depression.
 
Aet290204 said:
Superb summary. 👍
Although I disagree about Alastair Campbell. I think it was his job to be dislikable. He now writes some superb stuff about, and is an excellent ambassador for mental illness and depression.
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I agree it wasn't his job to be likeable and for what it's worth the job he did was a great one for the Labour Party at that time. He is direct and isn't the most tactful person in the world but by and large he is right IMHO with the things he says on TV and Twitter.
 
Nero said:
New Labour between 97 and 2005 were far better than the successive Tory governments since 2011. Sadly, Blair shot himself in the foot over Iraq and Brown had to deal with a financial crisis 30 years in the making. I think a Brown government would have been a great thing and the country a much different place today.
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And, despite a tradition of chancellors leaving a note for their successors, it forever became a tool for Tory activists to cry about there being no money left.
 
Otto42 said:
War crimes is way over the top, most western leaders since 1945 would have been in jail on that basis. I think Blair believed that supporting Bush in getting rid of Saddam was the right thing to do for the country and Bush was going in whatever Britain decided. Blair thought he could influence Bush, this was his big mistake. Parliament (including most Conservatives) voted to go to war, the dodgy dossier has been over played and that was also a mistake on Blair's part. I honestly believe that Parliament would have voted to support Bush without the dossier, but Blair wanted to take his party with him too.
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Of course it's an exaggeration to suggest that he should be prosecuted for war crimes and I also believe that he supported military intervention out of good intent.

To understand that motivation you have to understand his ideology around foreign policy, particularly the ability for western nations to intervene against oppressive states.

Kosovo is the perfect example of this, military intervention saved thousands of lives and was a huge success in humanitarian terms, but this is rarely mentioned at all, never mind as a context for Iraq.
 
Aet290204 said:
Superb summary. 👍
Although I disagree about Alastair Campbell. I think it was his job to be dislikable. He now writes some superb stuff about, and is an excellent ambassador for mental illness and depression.
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Agree. Saw Alistair Campbell speak at a conference a couple of years ago in London. He was superb. Talked of his battle with depression and was very succinct with his views about the way the country was heading then under, at the time, May and the rise of populism.
 
Jonny Ingbar said:
Of course it's an exaggeration to suggest that he should be prosecuted for war crimes and I also believe that he supported military intervention out of good intent.

To understand that motivation you have to understand his ideology around foreign policy, particularly the ability for western nations to intervene against oppressive states.

Kosovo is the perfect example of this, military intervention saved thousands of lives and was a huge success in humanitarian terms, but this is rarely mentioned at all, never mind as a context for Iraq.
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Also Sierra Leone.

However, that does not mean he shouldn't also be prosecuted for Iraq. It was a mistake, it was for reasons that contravened International Law and it was a result of hubris on the back of Kosovo and Sierra Leone, facilitated by the abandonment of best practice when it comes to decision making.

A prosecution in the UK, by the UK, would have done two things, as I argues at the time.

Firstly it would have partly restored the UK's reputation, or at least that of it's people and some of it's most important democratic principles, particularly in the muslim world.

Secondly, it would have served as a warning for future governments that they will be accountable, so must ensure they do everything right, which means getting the process right.

With Iraq, we made the decision first and then looked for the evidence to justify it, rather than letting the evidence lead to a decision. Plus Blair operated a small sofa cabinet of like minded people to make the decision, rather than the wider cabinet with more diverse views which tends to lead to better decisions.
 
Lefty said:
Also Sierra Leone.

However, that does not mean he shouldn't also be prosecuted for Iraq. It was a mistake, it was for reasons that contravened International Law and it was a result of hubris on the back of Kosovo and Sierra Leone, facilitated by the abandonment of best practice when it comes to decision making.

A prosecution in the UK, by the UK, would have done two things, as I argues at the time.

Firstly it would have partly restored the UK's reputation, or at least that of it's people and some of it's most important democratic principles, particularly in the muslim world.

Secondly, it would have served as a warning for future governments that they will be accountable, so must ensure they do everything right, which means getting the process right.

With Iraq, we made the decision first and then looked for the evidence to justify it, rather than letting the evidence lead to a decision. Plus Blair operated a small sofa cabinet of like minded people to make the decision, rather than the wider cabinet with more diverse views which tends to lead to better decisions.
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It may of been a mistake, but there is a good reason why mistakes fall far short of the level of culpability that qualifies a prosecution.

It's also an important point that the government will always seek legal advice on the point of whether the action is lawful, or not.

Personally I feel that Blair and the UK was under heavy pressure from the US to follow in line with their need for a reckoning, following 9-11.
 
I enjoyed these documentaries. Not a big fan fo Blair as a person, I still think he looked after Tony first, then others, compared with someone like Corbyn who damaged himself at times in an attempt to help others. Before Iraq, Blair's Government did well to invest in state education, introduce min pay rates, bring out fairer employment law, stop fighting in Northern Ireland.
 
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