Tony Blair's premiership- 1997 to 2007

1997-2007

key events

• Britain involved in wars and conflicts

  • Iraq War in 2003

  • Sierra Leone(2000)

  • air strikes and invasion of Afghanistan(2001)

• Reaction to 9/11 attack on WTC

  • Blair pledged to stand ‘shoulder to shoulder’ with George W Bush'

• Large backbench rebellions on a range of issues

  • Iraq War

  • tuition fees

  • foundation hospitals

  • defeat in the Commons over anti-terror legislation in 2005

• Labour accused of exempting formula 1 from a ban on tobacco advertising and sponsorship in exchange for a £1 mil donation from Bernie Ecclestone

what was Blair’s most significant and most congratulated policy

The Good Friday Agreement

it began a peace process in NI

Blair’s other policies (8)

• making the Bank of England independent

• devolution to Scotland and Wales

• introduced National Minimum Wage

• Lords Reform

• freedom of information Act

• CONTROVERSIAL public sector reforms

• introduction of tuition fees

• controversial anti-terror proposals

evidence of tony Blair being in control

• deliberately took a more presidential approach to this

• was able to use his large parliamentary majority to exercise power over his cabinet

  • Blair would meet with one or two ministers (through bilateral meetings) about key issues rather than discussing them with the whole cabinet→ dubbed ‘sofa government’

  • e.g. in discussions surrounding the Iraq War, he excluded his International Development Secretary (Clare Short)

• he was able to absorb huge backbench rebellion in 2003 over Iraq

  • was clear that Blair would lose some ministers over Iraq, however he only lost one (Robin Cook) before the key vote in parliament

what were Blair’s most succesful policies

House of Lords being partially reformed and devolved governments introduced into Scotland and Wales

biggest success was the Good Friday Agreement 1998

evidence of Blair losing control

• his popularity began to weaken over the Iraq War

• keeping Short until the main phase of the war was over (while Robin Cook resigned ) was perceived as a sign of weakness

  • in normal circumstances, Blair would’ve not hesitated to sack anyone

what was Blair’s most high profile parliamentary defeat?

in 2005, regarding amendment to the Terrorism Bill-49 Labour MPs rebelled

this was over a proposal to all terrorist suspects to be held without charge for 90 days-60 day backup plan also rejected (Commons eventually backed a 28 day period)

how and why did his premiership end?

• 2003 decision to invade Iraq

  • was executed without a UN mandate

  • failure to find WMDs in Iraq lead people to not trust him

• many MPs also criticised Blair for not condemning Israel for bombing Lebanon