In British politics, a Lib–Lab pact is a working arrangement between the Liberal Democrats (in previous times, the Liberal Party ) and the Labour Party .
100-600: There have been four such arrangements, and one alleged proposal, at the national level. In many local councils in the UK there are similar arrangements, although there are also arrangements where the Lib Dems and Labour oppose each other and instead form a local alliance with another party or with independent councillors. Before the Labour Party had been formed, various candidates stood for Parliament with backing from both
200-589: A minority government . This government fell after a vote of no confidence was passed by one vote in March 1979, whereby Callaghan was forced to hold a general election in May , in which Margaret Thatcher led the Conservatives into power. In the lead-up to the 1997 general election , a coalition government was discussed by Tony Blair and the Lib Dems, according to Paddy Ashdown 's The Ashdown Diaries . Ashdown,
300-550: A political realignment on the centre-left and usher in a period of left-wing unity, and only reneged after Deputy Prime Minister John Prescott threatened to resign over the issue in 1998. After the hung parliament resulting from the 2010 general election , the Liberal Democrats, as they had indicated they would do so prior to the election, first began negotiations with the Conservatives—the party that had won
400-515: A "democratic socialist" himself in the same year. However, the move away from nationalisation in the old Clause IV made many on the left wing of the Labour Party feel that Labour was moving away from traditional socialist principles of nationalisation set out in 1918, and was seen by them as part of a shift of the party towards "New Labour". Blair inherited the Labour leadership at a time when
500-487: A Sierra Leone rebel group. Journalist Andrew Marr has argued that the success of ground attacks, real and threatened, over air strikes alone was influential on how Blair planned the Iraq War, and that the success of the first three wars Blair fought "played to his sense of himself as a moral war leader". When asked in 2010 if the success of Palliser may have "embolden[ed] British politicians" to think of military action as
600-629: A change to the alternative vote system, followed by a referendum on proportional representation, if an arrangement that would keep him in government could be agreed. A Lib–Lab coalition would, however, have been eight seats short of a majority. A coalition of Labour, the Liberal Democrats, the SDLP , Plaid Cymru , the Alliance Party of Northern Ireland and the Green Party —a "rainbow" or "traffic light" coalition—would have been needed to give
700-468: A coalition government with the Liberal Democrats on the day of the general election, until the full scale of his Labour Party's majority became clear at 03:05 on the morning of 2 May 1997; ending eighteen years of Conservative rule. Encouraged by former SDP leader Roy Jenkins , Blair still considered bringing the Lib Dems into the Cabinet after his election victory, as he believed this would help to create
800-437: A coalition would be "bad for the country". David Laws , chief negotiator for the Liberal Democrats in coalition negotiations, subsequently commented on Labour's preparation and conduct in negotiations; his main areas of criticism centred on Labour's lack of contrition about their record over the previous thirteen years, inadequate preparation for discussions, their unwillingness to accommodate Liberal Democrat policy proposals in
900-622: A deal with Plaid Cymru, Williams was named Cabinet Secretary for Education in Jones's new Welsh Government ; her appointment as Education Secretary was subject to ratification by Liberal Democrat members at a special conference in Newtown, Powys , on 21 May 2016 and was overwhelmingly approved. After the first general election to the reconvened Scottish Parliament in 1999, the Scottish Liberal Democrats signed up to what
1000-630: A heart attack on 12 May 1994. Blair defeated John Prescott and Margaret Beckett in the subsequent leadership election and became Leader of the Opposition . As is customary for the holder of that office, Blair was appointed a Privy Counsellor . It has long been rumoured a deal was struck between Blair and Shadow Chancellor Gordon Brown at the former Granita restaurant in Islington , in which Blair promised to give Brown control of economic policy in return for Brown not standing against him in
1100-694: A historic rebranding of the party, which became known as " New Labour ". Blair became the youngest prime minister of the 20th century after his party won a landslide victory of 418 seats (the largest in its history) in the 1997 general election , bringing an end to 18 years in the opposition. It was the first victory for the Labour Party in nearly 23 years, the last one being in October 1974 . During his first term , Blair enacted constitutional reforms and significantly increased public spending on healthcare and education while also introducing controversial market-based reforms in these areas. In addition, Blair saw
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#17327729719141200-584: A leadership election in which Brown was the only candidate. At a special party conference in Manchester on 24 June 2007, Blair formally handed over the leadership of the Labour Party to Brown, who had been Chancellor of the Exchequer in Blair's three ministries. Blair tendered his resignation as prime minister on 27 June and Brown assumed office the same afternoon. Blair resigned from his Sedgefield seat in
1300-510: A minority administration. Following a series of close votes and much criticism of the weakness of the Assembly administration, Labour and the Liberal Democrats formed a coalition in October 2000 with the two parties sharing power, including ministerial appointments, with Labour the majority party. The agreement ended at the elections of 2003 when Labour won 50% of the seats and decided to form
1400-454: A minority government. On 11 May 2016, following the 2016 election six days earlier, when the governing Labour Party had 29 AMs elected, one fewer than in 2011 and two short of an overall majority, Welsh Assembly members failed to elect a new First Minister on their return to the Senedd , after the roll-call tied the vote at 29–29; Plaid Cymru nominated its leader Leanne Wood , and won
1500-475: A policy option, General Sir David Richards admitted there "might be something in that". From the start of the War on Terror in 2001, Blair strongly supported the foreign policy of George W. Bush , participating in the 2001 invasion of Afghanistan and 2003 invasion of Iraq . The invasion of Iraq was particularly controversial, as it attracted widespread public opposition and 139 of Blair's own MPs opposed it. As
1600-506: A profile within the party. Despite his defeat, William Russell, political correspondent for The Glasgow Herald , described Blair as "a very good candidate", while acknowledging that the result was "a disaster" for the Labour Party. In contrast to his later centrism , Blair made it clear in a letter he wrote to Labour leader Michael Foot in July 1982 (published in 2006) that he had "come to Socialism through Marxism" and considered himself on
1700-526: A result, he faced criticism over the policy itself and the circumstances of the decision. Alastair Campbell described Blair's statement that the intelligence on WMDs was "beyond doubt" as his "assessment of the assessment that was given to him." In 2009, Blair stated that he would have supported removing Saddam Hussein from power even in the face of proof that he had no such weapons. Playwright Harold Pinter and former Malaysian prime minister Mahathir Mohamad accused Blair of war crimes. Testifying before
1800-409: A result, he faced criticism over the policy itself and the circumstances of the decision. The Iraq Inquiry report of 2016 gave a damning assessment of Blair's role in the Iraq War. As the casualties of the Iraq War mounted, Blair was accused of misleading Parliament, and his popularity dropped dramatically. Blair won a third term after Labour won a third election victory in 2005 , in part thanks to
1900-593: A second term after Labour won a second landslide victory in the 2001 general election . Three months into his second term , Blair's premiership was shaped by the 9/11 terrorist attacks , resulting in the start of the war on terror . Blair supported the foreign policy of the George W. Bush administration by ensuring that the British Armed Forces participated in the War in Afghanistan to overthrow
2000-490: A single 30-minute session on Wednesdays. In addition to PMQs, Blair held monthly press conferences at which he fielded questions from journalists and, from 2002, broke precedent by agreeing to give evidence twice yearly before the most senior Commons select committee, the Liaison Committee . Blair was sometimes perceived as paying insufficient attention both to the views of his own Cabinet colleagues and to those of
2100-468: A source of optimism, as they indicated that the Conservatives were in decline. Virtually every opinion poll since late-1992 put Labour ahead of the Conservatives with enough support to form an overall majority. Blair became Prime Minister of the United Kingdom on 2 May 1997; aged 43, he was the youngest person to reach that office since Lord Liverpool became prime minister aged 42 in 1812. He
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#17327729719142200-406: A strong economy, with real incomes of British citizens growing 18% between 1997 and 2006. Britain saw rapid productivity growth and significant GDP growth, as well as falling poverty rates and inequality which, despite stubbornly failing to fall, stalled thanks to New Labour's economic policies (such as tax credits). Despite the financial bubble developing in the property markets, studies have credited
2300-485: A strong proponent of a Lib–Lab coalition, said that from Blair's point of view, in order to get the Conservatives out of power and because he wanted to move his party towards the New Labour ideal, a coalition would strengthen his majority in the likely event of a victory. To get the Liberal Democrats into his Cabinet, he allegedly agreed on their terms of electoral reform . Blair was still considering attempting to form
2400-576: A working majority of one. For this, amongst other reasons, the talks failed. On the collapse of talks with Labour, a deal between the Liberal Democrats and the Conservative Party was reached (subsequently being approved by Liberal Democrats members at a special party conference). There was a significant level of hostility to such a deal within the Labour Party, with coalition proposals being opposed by, among others, former Cabinet ministers John Reid and David Blunkett . John Reid said that such
2500-525: Is a British politician who served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 1997 to 2007 and Leader of the Labour Party from 1994 to 2007. He was Leader of the Opposition from 1994 to 1997 and held various shadow cabinet posts from 1987 to 1994. Blair was Member of Parliament (MP) for Sedgefield from 1983 to 2007, and was special envoy of the Quartet on the Middle East from 2007 to 2015. He
2600-425: Is the second- longest-serving prime minister in post-war British history after Margaret Thatcher , the longest-serving Labour politician to have held the office, and the first and only person to date to lead the party to three consecutive general election victories. Blair attended the independent school Fettes College , studied law at St John's College, Oxford , and qualified as a barrister. He became involved in
2700-468: The 1929 general election , Labour won the greatest number of seats, but did not have a parliamentary majority. The now-much-weakened Liberals allowed the formation of the second Labour government by not aligning with the Conservatives to defeat the new government. In March 1977, the Labour government – lacking a majority following a by-election defeat – faced a motion of no confidence . In order to remain in office, Prime Minister James Callaghan approached
2800-502: The 1983 general election was called. Blair's initial inquiries discovered that the left was trying to arrange the selection for Les Huckfield , sitting MP for Nuneaton, who was trying elsewhere; several sitting MPs displaced by boundary changes were also interested in it. When he discovered the Trimdon branch had not yet made a nomination, Blair visited them and won the support of the branch secretary John Burton , and with Burton's help
2900-758: The Gibraltar Parliament , but form affiliations with the local Gibraltarian parties, with the Liberal Democrats affiliating with the Liberal Party of Gibraltar (LPG) and Labour affiliating with the Gibraltar Socialist Labour Party (GSLP). The two parties formed the GSLP–Liberal Alliance in 2000 and together have been the government in power since 2011. Whilst not a pact, ahead of the 1997 election Labour Leader Tony Blair and Lib Dem leader Paddy Ashdown set up
3000-947: The Good Friday Agreement (after 30 years of conflict) was widely recognised. Following the Omagh bombing on 15 August 1998, by members of the Real IRA opposed to the peace process, which killed 29 people and wounded hundreds, Blair visited the County Tyrone town and met with victims at Royal Victoria Hospital, Belfast . In his first six years in office, Blair ordered British troops into combat five times, more than any other prime minister in British history. This included Iraq in both 1998 and 2003 , Kosovo (1999), Sierra Leone (2000) and Afghanistan (2001). The Kosovo War, which Blair had advocated on moral grounds,
3100-606: The Home Office to deport illegal immigrants. Amid the Cash-for-Honours scandal , Blair was interviewed three times as prime minister, though only as a witness and not under caution . The Afghanistan and Iraq wars continued, and in 2006, Blair announced he would resign within a year. He resigned the party leadership on 24 June 2007 and as prime minister on 27 June, and was succeeded by Gordon Brown , his chancellor . After leaving office, Blair gave up his seat and
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3200-489: The House of Commons on 6 July 1983, Blair stated, "I am a socialist not through reading a textbook that has caught my intellectual fancy, nor through unthinking tradition, but because I believe that, at its best, socialism corresponds most closely to an existence that is both rational and moral. It stands for cooperation, not confrontation; for fellowship, not fear. It stands for equality." Once elected, Blair's political ascent
3300-533: The Iraq Inquiry on 29 January 2010, Blair said Saddam Hussein was a "monster and I believe he threatened not just the region but the world." Blair said that British and American attitude towards Hussein had "changed dramatically" after the September 11 attacks . Blair denied that he would have supported the invasion of Iraq even if he had thought Hussein had no weapons of mass destruction. He said he believed
3400-633: The Israel–Lebanon conflict . On 7 September 2006, Blair publicly stated he would step down as leader by the time of the Trades Union Congress conference held from 10 to 13 September 2007, despite promising to serve a full term during the previous general election campaign. On 10 May 2007, during a speech at the Trimdon Labour Club , Blair announced his intention to resign as both Labour leader and prime minister, triggering
3500-735: The Labour-Liberal Democrat joint committee on constitutional reform to discuss devolution in Wales and Scotland, and led to Prime Minister Tony Blair setting up a joint Lib–Lab cabinet committee . In part this led to the Scottish and Welsh alliances noted above. The committee was disbanded by Tony Blair and Charles Kennedy in September 2001. Local government in the United Kingdom Local government in
3600-674: The Liberal Party and the Labour Representation League ; these included Thomas Burt , Harry Broadhurst and Alexander Macdonald . These MPs were referred to as "Lib–Lab", although there was not a formal pact. This agreement eventually fell apart with the formation of the Independent Labour Party and the Labour Representation Committee . In 1903, an agreement was made between Herbert Gladstone (then Chief Whip of
3700-681: The Taliban , destroy al-Qaeda , and capture Osama bin Laden . Blair supported the 2003 invasion of Iraq and had the British Armed Forces participate in the Iraq War , on the inaccurate beliefs that Saddam Hussein 's regime possessed weapons of mass destruction and developed ties with al-Qaeda . The invasion of Iraq was particularly controversial, as it attracted widespread public opposition and 139 of Blair's own MPs opposed it. As
3800-653: The introduction of a minimum wage , tuition fees for higher education, constitutional reform such as devolution in Scotland and Wales , an extensive expansion of LGBT+ rights in the UK , and significant progress in the Northern Ireland peace process with the passing of the landmark Good Friday Agreement . On foreign policy, Blair oversaw British interventions in Kosovo in 1999 and Sierra Leone in 2000 , which were generally perceived to be successful. Blair won
3900-576: The 1983 general election endorsed left-wing policies that Labour advocated in the early 1980s. He called for Britain to leave the EEC as early as the 1970s, though he had told his selection conference that he personally favoured continuing membership and voted "Yes" in the 1975 referendum on the subject . He opposed the Exchange Rate Mechanism (ERM) in 1986 but supported the ERM by 1989. He
4000-490: The 1997 election that New Labour would govern "from the radical centre", and according to one lifelong Labour Party member always described himself as a social democrat . In a 2007 opinion piece in The Guardian , left-wing commentator Neil Lawson described Blair as to the right of centre . A YouGov opinion poll in 2005 found that a small majority of British voters, including many New Labour supporters, placed Blair on
4100-564: The 2015 election grew closer. A senior party figure said, "The contact is there and the leaders' offices are now in touch." Senior members of Miliband's team, including Lord Adonis, the former Cabinet minister, had been urging him privately to prepare for fresh coalition negotiations after the 2015 general election because opinion polls suggested no party would win an outright majority in 2015. In 2014, Lib Dem minister Norman Lamb warned that "it could be enormously damaging for [the Lib Dems]" if
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4200-680: The EU. With specific regards to Blair's LGBTQ+ reforms, Blair introduced the Civil Partnership Act 2004 which granted civil partners rights and responsibilities similar to those in civil marriages, equalised the age of consent between straight and gay couples, ended the ban on gay people serving in the British military, introduced the Gender Recognition Act 2004 which allows those with gender dysphoria to legally change their gender, repealed Section 28 , gave gay couples
4300-543: The Garter by Queen Elizabeth II in 2022. At various points in his premiership, Blair was among both the most popular and most unpopular politicians in British history. As prime minister, he achieved the highest recorded approval ratings during his first few years in office but also one of the lowest ratings during and after the Iraq War. Blair is usually rated as above average in historical rankings and public opinion of British prime ministers. Anthony Charles Lynton Blair
4400-476: The House of Commons. His style was sometimes criticised as not that of a prime minister and head of government , which he was, but of a president and head of state, which he was not. Blair was accused of excessive reliance on spin . He was the first UK prime minister to have been formally questioned by police, though not under caution , while still in office. As the casualties of the Iraq War mounted, Blair
4500-574: The Labour Party and was elected to the House of Commons in 1983 for the Sedgefield constituency in County Durham . As a backbencher , Blair supported moving the party to the political centre of British politics . He was appointed to Neil Kinnock 's shadow cabinet in 1988 and was appointed shadow home secretary by John Smith in 1992. Following Smith's death in 1994, Blair won a leadership election to succeed him. As leader, Blair began
4600-622: The Labour leader, and Ed Davey , the Liberal Democrat leader, refused to rule out a possible alliance after the 2024 general election . On 13 June 2023, Labour Party National Campaign Coordinator Shabana Mahmood ruled out a Lib–Lab pact in the by-elections in Mid Bedfordshire , Uxbridge and South Ruislip and Selby and Ainsty . When the first elections to the new Welsh Assembly took place in 1999 no one party had an absolute majority, and initially Labour sought to run
4700-434: The Liberal Democrat leader, hinted at a possible alliance after the 2019 general election in the event that Jeremy Corbyn resigned as Labour leader. Once again, this was not possible, because the Conservatives received a majority of seats at the election, meaning that a Lib–Lab pact would be below the majority mark. After the 2023 local elections , in which both Labour and Liberal Democrats made gains. Both Keir Starmer ,
4800-648: The Liberal Party) and Ramsay MacDonald (Secretary of the Labour Representation Committee ) that, in thirty constituencies, the Labour Party and the Liberal Party would not stand against each other, and thus would avoid the risk of splitting their vote. As a result of this agreement, in contests against the Conservative Party , 29 Labour MPs were returned at the 1906 general election . At the 1923 general election , both parties campaigned on
4900-435: The Liberal Party, at the time led by David Steel . Former Foreign Secretary Callaghan had been Prime Minister for just one year, having succeeded Harold Wilson who had led Labour to a three-seat majority at the October 1974 general election . An agreement was negotiated, under the terms of which the Labour Party accepted a limited number of Liberal Party policy proposals and in exchange, the Liberal Party agreed to vote with
5000-653: The NHS and other public services, increasing spending from 39.9% of GDP to 48.1% in 2010–11. They pledged in 2001 to bring NHS spending to the levels of other European countries, and doubled spending in real terms to over £100 billion in England alone. Non-European immigration rose significantly during the period from 1997, not least because of the government 's abolition of the primary purpose rule in June 1997. This change made it easier for UK residents to bring foreign spouses into
5100-662: The Rolling Stones . Leaving Fettes College at the age of 18, Blair next spent a gap year in London working as a rock music promoter. In 1972, at the age of 19, Blair matriculated at St John's College, Oxford , reading jurisprudence for three years. As a student, he played guitar and sang in a rock band called Ugly Rumours , and performed stand-up comedy . He was influenced by fellow student and Anglican priest Peter Thomson , who awakened his religious faith and left-wing politics. While at Oxford, Blair has stated that he
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#17327729719145200-519: The UK's strong economic performance, but with a substantially reduced majority, due to the UK's involvement in the Iraq War. During his third term , Blair pushed for more systemic public sector reform and brokered a settlement to restore powersharing to Northern Ireland. He had a surge in popularity at the time of terrorist bombings of London of July 2005, but by the Spring of 2006 faced significant difficulties, most notably with scandals over failures by
5300-521: The United Kingdom has origins which pre-date the United Kingdom itself, as each of the four countries of the United Kingdom has its own separate system. For an overview, see Administrative geography of the United Kingdom . For details, see: For the history of local government in each country, see: For local government entities in each country, see Tony Blair [REDACTED] Sir Anthony Charles Lynton Blair (born 6 May 1953)
5400-579: The backing of the Conservatives and UKIP , while Labour's incumbent First Minister Carwyn Jones won the support of sole Liberal Democrat Kirsty Williams , the only non-Labour member to back Jones in the tied vote for First Minister (and who, up until the day after the election, had been the leader of the Welsh Liberal Democrats ), and his own party. On 19 May 2016, after Jones was reinstalled unopposed as First Minister, following
5500-485: The breakaway SDP faction had merged with the Liberal Party ; the resulting Liberal Democrats seemed to pose a major threat to the Labour base. Blair, the leader of the modernising faction, had an entirely different vision, arguing that the long-term trends had to be reversed. The Labour Party was too locked into a base that was shrinking, since it was based on the working-class, on trade unions, and on residents of subsidised council housing. The rapidly growing middle-class
5600-589: The country. The former government advisor Andrew Neather in the Evening Standard stated that the deliberate policy of ministers from late 2000 until early 2008 was to open up the UK to mass migration. Neather later stated that his words had been twisted, saying: "The main goal was to allow in more migrant workers at a point when – hard as it is to imagine now – the booming economy was running up against skills shortages.... Somehow this has become distorted by excitable Right-wing newspaper columnists into being
5700-475: The education and health sectors; introduced student tuition fees ; introduced a welfare to work scheme and sought to reduce certain categories of welfare payments. He did not reverse the privatisation of the railways enacted by his predecessor John Major and instead strengthened regulation (by creating the Office of Rail Regulation ) and limited fare rises to inflation +1%. Blair and Brown raised spending on
5800-558: The end of 1954, Blair's parents and their two sons moved from Paisley Terrace to Adelaide , South Australia . His father lectured in law at the University of Adelaide . In Australia, Blair's sister, Sarah, was born. The Blairs lived in the suburb of Dulwich close to the university. The family returned to the United Kingdom in mid-1958. They lived for a time with Hazel's mother and stepfather (William McClay) at their home in Stepps on
5900-435: The end of the 1990–92 recession . At the 1996 Labour Party conference, Blair stated that his three top priorities on coming to office were "education, education, and education". Aided by the unpopularity of John Major's Conservative government (itself deeply divided over the European Union ), Blair won a landslide victory for Labour at the 1997 general election , ending eighteen years of Conservative Party government, with
6000-480: The fact that Labour was fighting a legal action against planned boundary changes, and had selected candidates on the basis of previous boundaries. When the legal challenge failed, the party had to rerun all selections on the new boundaries; most were based on existing seats, but unusually in County Durham a new Sedgefield constituency had been created out of Labour-voting areas which had no obvious predecessor seat. The selection for Sedgefield did not begin until after
6100-419: The family's grocery shop to Blair's mother, Hazel. Blair has an elder brother, William , and a younger sister, Sarah. Blair's first home was with his family at Paisley Terrace in the Willowbrae area of Edinburgh. During this period, his father worked as a junior tax inspector whilst studying for a law degree from the University of Edinburgh . Blair's first relocation was when he was nineteen months old. At
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#17327729719146200-811: The final stage of a long term shift of the Labour Party to the right. There is some evidence that Blair's long term dominance of the centre forced his Conservative opponents to shift a long distance to the left to challenge his hegemony there. Leading Conservatives of the post-New Labour era hold Blair in high regard: George Osborne describes him as "the master", Michael Gove thought he had an "entitlement to conservative respect" in February 2003, while David Cameron reportedly maintained Blair as an informal adviser. Former Conservative Party Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher declared Blair and New Labour to be her greatest achievement. Blair introduced significant constitutional reforms; promoted new rights for gay people; and signed treaties integrating Britain more closely with
6300-438: The government in any subsequent motion of no confidence. This "pact" was the first official bi-party agreement since the Second World War (there would be a Conservative–Lib Dem coalition following the 2010 general election), though it was far short of a coalition. The Lib–Lab Pact's end was confirmed on 7 September 1978, by which time Callaghan was expected to call a general election, but instead he decided to remain as leader of
6400-448: The growth to investments in education and the maintenance of fiscal responsibility, rather than a financial sugar-high. During his time as prime minister, Blair kept direct taxes low, while raising indirect taxation; invested a significant amount in Human capital ; introduced a National Minimum Wage and some new employment rights (while keeping Margaret Thatcher 's trade union reforms). He introduced substantial market-based reforms in
6500-472: The heaviest Conservative defeat since 1906 . In 1996, the manifesto New Labour, New Life for Britain was published, which set out the party's new " Third Way " centrist approach to policy, and was presented as the brand of a newly reformed party that had altered Clause IV and endorsed market economics . In May 1995, Labour had achieved considerable success in the local and European elections and had won four by-elections. For Blair, these achievements were
6600-482: The house has the right to attempt to form a government first, either on their own or in a coalition. He stated his willingness to work with the Labour Party if it won a plurality of the votes in 2015. However, some reports said it was unlikely that this would happen under the leadership of Nick Clegg, as both Ed Miliband and Ed Balls voiced discontent with Nick Clegg over his partnership with David Cameron. Later reports indicated that Miliband and Balls were more relaxed with
6700-421: The invasion helped promote the rise of ISIS . The Chilcot Inquiry report of 2016 gave a damning assessment of Blair's role in the Iraq War, though the former prime minister again refused to apologise for his decision to back the US-led invasion. One of Blair's first acts as prime minister was to replace the then twice-weekly 15-minute sessions of Prime Minister's Questions held on Tuesdays and Thursdays with
6800-479: The issue of free trade . The Conservative Party, which had campaigned to introduce protective tariffs , lost its parliamentary majority but remained the largest party in the House of Commons . The Liberals agreed to enable the formation of the first Labour minority government in 1924, under the leadership of Prime Minister Ramsay MacDonald. The minority government lasted a little over nine months; Conservative Stanley Baldwin succeeded MacDonald as Prime Minister. At
6900-435: The leadership election. Whether this is true or not, the relationship between Blair and Brown was central to the fortunes of New Labour , and they mostly remained united in public, despite reported serious private rifts. During his speech at the 1994 Labour Party conference, Blair announced a forthcoming proposal to update the party's objects and objectives, which was widely interpreted to relate to replacing Clause IV of
7000-414: The left. Like Tony Benn , Blair believed that the "Labour right" was bankrupt, saying "[s]ocialism ultimately must appeal to the better minds of the people. You cannot do that if you are tainted overmuch with a pragmatic period in power." Yet, he saw the hard left as no better, saying: There is an arrogance and self-righteousness about many of the groups on the far left which is deeply unattractive to
7100-433: The most votes and seats—about the possibility of forming a government; but, after talks appeared to have stalled, complementary negotiations were undertaken with Labour. Labour's delegation for negotiations included: Peter Mandelson , Andrew Adonis , Ed Miliband and Ed Balls . Press rumours of a possible Lib Dem–Labour deal were publicised, with Prime Minister Gordon Brown alleged to be willing to offer to legislate for
7200-465: The ordinary would-be member ... There's too much mixing only with people [with] whom they agree. With a general election due, Blair had not been selected as a candidate anywhere. He was invited to stand again in Beaconsfield, and was initially inclined to agree but was advised by his head of chambers Derry Irvine to find somewhere else which might be winnable. The situation was complicated by
7300-553: The outskirts of north-east Glasgow. Blair's father accepted a job as a lecturer at Durham University , and moved the family to Durham when Blair was five. It was the beginning of a long association Blair was to have with Durham. Since childhood, Blair has been a fan of Newcastle United Football Club . With his parents basing their family in Durham, Blair attended the Chorister School from 1961 to 1966. Aged 13, he
7400-552: The party was ascendant over the Conservatives in the opinion polls, since the Conservative government's reputation in monetary policy declined as a result of the Black Wednesday economic disaster of September 1992. Blair's election as leader saw Labour support surge higher still in spite of the continuing economic recovery and fall in unemployment that the Conservative government (led by John Major ) had overseen since
7500-422: The party went into coalition with Miliband's Labour. However, neither a coalition nor a pact between the Lib Dems and Labour was possible, following the Conservatives winning a majority at the 2015 general election and the loss of 49 Liberal Democrat seats. The scale of victory was unexpected by all major polls, and this was the first time a Conservative majority government had been formed in 23 years. Jo Swinson ,
7600-489: The party's constitution with a new statement of aims and values. This involved the deletion of the party's stated commitment to "the common ownership of the means of production and exchange", which was generally understood to mean wholesale nationalisation of major industries. At a special conference in April 1995, the clause was replaced by a statement that the party is " democratic socialist ", and Blair also claimed to be
7700-597: The party. He stood as a candidate for the Hackney council elections of 1982 in Queensbridge ward, a safe Labour area, but was not selected. In 1982, Blair was selected as the Labour Party candidate for the safe Conservative seat of Beaconsfield , where there was a forthcoming by-election. Although Blair lost the Beaconsfield by-election and Labour's share of the vote fell by ten percentage points, he acquired
7800-418: The potential programme for government, and the arrogant and patronising attitude of specific key Labour figures. He said that whilst he felt Gordon Brown was quite serious about pursuing talks, he believed former minister Ed Balls was deliberately "sabotaging" them. Nick Clegg stated his opinion prior to the 2010 general election that the party which wins the most seats but fails to get an absolute majority in
7900-473: The right of the political spectrum. The Financial Times argued that Blair is not conservative but instead a populist . Critics and admirers tend to agree that Blair's electoral success was based on his ability to occupy the centre ground and appeal to voters across the political spectrum, to the extent that he has been fundamentally at odds with traditional Labour Party values. Some left-wing critics, such as Mike Marqusee in 2001, argued that Blair oversaw
8000-565: The right to adopt and enacted several anti-discrimination policies into law. In 2014 he was proclaimed a "gay icon" by the Gay Times . The New Labour government increased police powers by adding to the number of arrestable offences, compulsory DNA recording and the use of dispersal orders. Under Blair's government the amount of new legislation increased which attracted criticism. He also introduced tough anti-terrorism and identity card legislation . Blair has been credited with overseeing
8100-447: The slogan " One member, one vote ", John Smith, with limited input from Blair, secured an end to the trade union block vote for Westminster candidate selection at the 1993 conference. But Blair and the modernisers wanted Smith to go further still, and called for radical adjustment of Party goals by repealing " Clause IV ", the historic commitment to nationalisation of industry. This would be achieved in 1995. John Smith died suddenly of
8200-486: The thought of a Lib–Lab government after the 2015 election. According to an article in The Daily Telegraph , a shadow Cabinet minister who was close to Miliband said: "Our activists really hate Clegg. But if having him as Deputy Prime Minister was the price of getting Ed into Number 10 then they would have to stick it." For years, Miliband is said to have refused to speak to Clegg, although relations thawed as
8300-610: The tide against the rebel forces; before deployment, the United Nations Mission in Sierra Leone had been on the verge of collapse. Palliser had been intended as an evacuation mission but Brigadier David Richards was able to convince Blair to allow him to expand the role; at the time, Richards' action was not known and Blair was assumed to be behind it. Blair ordered Operation Barras , a highly successful SAS / Parachute Regiment strike to rescue hostages from
8400-694: The traditional form of accepting the Stewardship of the Chiltern Hundreds , to which he was appointed by Brown in one of the latter's last acts as chancellor; the resulting by-election was won by Labour candidate Phil Wilson . Blair decided not to issue a list of Resignation Honours , making him the first prime minister of the modern era not to do so. In 2001, Blair said, "We are a left of centre party, pursuing economic prosperity and social justice as partners and not as opposites." Blair rarely applies such labels to himself; he promised before
8500-401: The world was safer as a result of the invasion. He said there was "no real difference between wanting regime change and wanting Iraq to disarm: regime change was US policy because Iraq was in breach of its UN obligations." In an October 2015 CNN interview with Fareed Zakaria , Blair apologised for his "mistakes" over the Iraq War and admitted there were "elements of truth" to the view that
8600-455: Was a member of the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament , despite never strongly being in favour of unilateral nuclear disarmament . Blair was helped on the campaign trail by soap opera actress Pat Phoenix , his father-in-law's girlfriend. At the age of thirty, he was elected as MP for Sedgefield in 1983; despite the party's landslide defeat at the general election . In his maiden speech in
8700-455: Was accused of misleading Parliament, and his popularity dropped as a result, with Labour's overall majority at the 2005 election reduced from 167 to 66 seats. As a combined result of the Blair–Brown pact , the Iraq War and low approval ratings, pressure built up within the Labour Party for Blair to resign. Over the summer of 2006, many MPs criticised Blair for not calling for a ceasefire in
8800-655: Was aligned with the reforming tendencies in the party (headed by leader Neil Kinnock) and in 1988 was promoted to the shadow Trade and Industry team as spokesman on the City of London . In 1987, he stood for election to the Shadow Cabinet , receiving 71 votes. When Kinnock resigned after a fourth consecutive Conservative victory in the 1992 general election , Blair became shadow home secretary under John Smith . The old guard argued that trends showed they were regaining strength under Smith's strong leadership. Meanwhile,
8900-506: Was also the first prime minister born after the Second World War and the accession of Elizabeth II to the throne. With victories in 1997, 2001, and 2005, Blair was the Labour Party's longest-serving prime minister, and the first person (and the only one, to date) to lead the party to three consecutive general election victories. His contribution towards assisting the Northern Ireland peace process by helping to negotiate
9000-604: Was appointed special envoy of the Quartet on the Middle East, a diplomatic post he held until 2015. He has been the executive chairman of the Tony Blair Institute for Global Change since 2016 and has made occasional political interventions, and has been a key influence on Keir Starmer . In 2009, Blair was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom by George W. Bush . He was made a Knight Companion of
9100-751: Was born on 6 May 1953 at Queen Mary Maternity Home in Edinburgh , Scotland. He was the second son of Leo and Hazel ( née Corscadden ) Blair. Leo Blair was the illegitimate son of two entertainers and was adopted as a baby by the Glasgow shipyard worker James Blair and his wife, Mary. Hazel Corscadden was the daughter of George Corscadden, a butcher and Orangeman who moved to Glasgow in 1916. In 1923, he returned to (and later died in) Ballyshannon , County Donegal, in Ireland . In Ballyshannon, Corscadden's wife, Sarah Margaret (née Lipsett), gave birth above
9200-451: Was briefly a Trotskyist , after reading the first volume of Isaac Deutscher 's biography of Leon Trotsky , which was "like a light going on". He graduated from Oxford at the age of 22 in 1975 with a second-class Honours B.A. in jurisprudence. In 1975, while Blair was at Oxford, his mother Hazel died aged 52 of thyroid cancer , which greatly affected him. After Oxford, Blair served his barrister pupillage at Lincoln's Inn , where he
9300-515: Was called to the Bar. He met his future wife, Cherie Booth , at the chambers founded by Derry Irvine (who was to be Blair's first lord chancellor), 11 King's Bench Walk Chambers. Blair joined the Labour Party shortly after graduating from Oxford in 1975. In the early 1980s, he was involved in Labour politics in Hackney South and Shoreditch , where he aligned himself with the " soft left " of
9400-434: Was initially a failure when it relied solely on air strikes; the threat of a ground offensive convinced Serbia's Slobodan Milošević to withdraw. Blair had been a major advocate for a ground offensive, which Bill Clinton was reluctant to do, and ordered that 50,000 soldiers – most of the available British Army – should be made ready for action. The following year, the limited Operation Palliser in Sierra Leone swiftly swung
9500-433: Was largely ignored, especially the more ambitious working-class families. They aspired to middle-class status but accepted the Conservative argument that Labour was holding ambitious people back with its levelling-down policies. They increasingly saw Labour in terms defined by the opposition, regarding higher taxes and higher interest rates. The steps towards what would become New Labour were procedural but essential. Calling on
9600-438: Was nominated by the branch. At the last minute, he was added to the shortlist and won the selection over Huckfield. It was the last candidate selection made by Labour before the election, and was made after the Labour Party had issued biographies of all its candidates ("Labour's Election Who's Who"). John Burton became Blair's election agent and one of his most trusted and longest-standing allies. Blair's election literature in
9700-638: Was rapid. Neil Kinnock appointed him in 1984 as assistant Treasury spokesman under Roy Hattersley who was Shadow Chancellor of the Exchequer . In May 1985, he appeared on the BBC's Question Time , arguing that the Conservative Government's Public Order White Paper was a threat to civil liberties. Blair demanded an inquiry into the Bank of England 's decision to rescue the collapsed Johnson Matthey bank in October 1985. By this time, Blair
9800-511: Was sent to spend his school term-time boarding at Fettes College in Edinburgh from 1966 to 1971. According to Blair, he hated his time at Fettes. His teachers were unimpressed with him; his biographer, John Rentoul , reported that "[a]ll the teachers I spoke to when researching the book said he was a complete pain in the backside and they were very glad to see the back of him." Blair reportedly modelled himself on Mick Jagger , lead singer of
9900-435: Was termed a "partnership government" with Labour , with both parties providing ministers in a shared government. Although standing on separate manifestos in the succeeding 2003 Scottish Parliament election the joint working continued, with Labour's Jack McConnell serving as First Minister , and the Lib Dems' Jim Wallace serving under him as Deputy First Minister (and Minister for Enterprise and Lifelong Learning ) who
10000-588: Was then succeeded by Nicol Stephen of the same party as Deputy First Minister. The Scottish Parliament general election of 2007 saw the Scottish National Party (SNP) surpass Labour as the largest party by one seat. The Scottish Liberal Democrats decided against coalition with either the SNP or Labour, and abstained in the vote for First Minister, won by SNP leader Alex Salmond . The major UK political parties do not stand candidates for election in
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