Blair's Legacy

What a week it’s been in British politics! The removal companies will certainly have their work cut out in Downing Street this week: Tony Blair has finally bowed out (where is he going to go, what is he going to do?), leaving Gordon Brown as the new PM.

The last ten years have been something of a mixed bag for Blair, though sadly the latter half of his tenure has seen far more downs than ups. He never really managed to recapture or capitalise upon the sense of awe that most of us (bar the Tories) experienced when Labour first swept to power in 1997 (the mood was accurately captured in Stephen Frears’ recent film The Queen with Helen Mirren; read my review here).

I’m not sure what to make of Blair’s time in power. Whatever my reservations about some of the decisions he made, I’m certainly happy that he was the one making them, as opposed to, say, William Hague (I shudder to think…) Sadly, Blair will be remembered more for his allegiance with the US administration and for the ensuing calamity in Iraq than for the many positive things he achieved: brokering the peace agreement and implementing a system of power-sharing in Northern Ireland; his focus on eliminating child poverty; improvements to the NHS; the minimum wage; equality for all; civil rights for gays and lesbians; the repeal of homophobic legislation such as Thatcher’s infamous Section 28. The list goes on.

[Having said that, the progress Blair’s government has made in the areas of equality and gay rights was all cast in a rather dubious light yesterday with the announcement that he is to convert to Roman Catholicism. As an atheist, I often find it hard to reconcile faith and issues of sexuality. How can someone who believes in gay rights, or someone who is gay, for that matter, become a member of an organisation that has systematically oppressed us for centuries? Moreover, why would they wish to do this? Of course, you could write a book on this subject.]

Neither am I sure what to make of his resignation speech, a minor PR stunt in itself. But when he said, “Hand on heart […] I did what I thought was right for our country”, I tend to believe him, though I wouldn’t trust those words from the mouths of many other world leaders. And though I vehemently disagree with a number of Labour’s policy decisions over the years (for instance, I still can’t quite believe that it was a Labour government that introduced university tuition fees), and in particular with the whole debacle in Iraq, I feel I can trust the reasoning behind their decisions, and am glad the Tories weren’t making those decisions instead.

Why is it that we trust Blair? I can’t say. Ultimately, this is the reason we elect leaders, in order that they may make agonising decisions which affect us all, so that we don’t have to.