Tag: “Tony Blair”

Yes that was me tweeting in German last night, digging into my modern languages education to remember all I could, and surprised how much that was. Truth is, as I am about to say to a conference in Berlin when I speak in English, French is the dominant foreign language in my head, and when [...]

Endlich, enfin, AT BLOODY LAST … Europe’s leaders are starting to realise that they might have to do something beyond enjoying the scenery in Davos to address the problem of youth unemployment. This morning’s Observer leads on the raising of jobs and the young to the top of the agenda for the upcoming EU summit. [...]

If anyone has had enough of my tributes to Philip Gould, I will not be offended if you surf immediately to another website. But I feel I should say something about his funeral yesterday, where a packed All Saints church in London W1 said farewell to one of the key architects of New Labour, and [...]

As the Liberal Democrats prepare for their conference, I hope enough of them will be tugged by the Democrat side of the equation to make an issue of the government’s preparations for the planned boundary changes. I refer not simply to the redrawing of boundaries, loaded though this is in favour of the Tories, but [...]

September 11 2001 was without doubt one of the most extraordinary of the many remarkable days I spent with Tony Blair. I’ve printed below my diary entry for that day. Within it, I make the point that in the face of terrorist attacks, world leaders like to say these events will not make them change [...]

Michael Heseltine has personal wealth, and a lifestyle, that is far removed from the vast bulk of people living in Britain’s inner cities, let alone those who took part in the riots. He spends his working life flitting in the back of a car between a beautiful home in Belgravia, and an even more beautiful [...]

Even though I thought it was nonsense at the time, I did understand why David Cameron used to drone on about Broken Britain in Opposition. He was trying to make the most of social and economic problems in the pursuit of inflicting political damage upon the Labour government. Though he failed to win the election, [...]

Nick Clegg is right to say the violence in London has been unacceptable, and the thieving opportunistic, and the senior police officer put up to do interviews in the absence of a Commissioner right to say the rooters and looters do not represent their communities. But both are wrong if they see this purely as [...]

I had really wanted to see the ‘My Resignation’ documentary on BBC4 last night. It is an interesting theme and the people making it seemed a cut above your average instant docmaker. Having interviewed me on a rainy day like today, they were also polite enough to tell me when the programme was on. But [...]

Just as News International threw Andy Coulson to the wolves in advance of last week’s PMQs, so at yesterday’s the PM did the same. In truth however, if Mr Cameron’s former communications director ‘turns out to have lied to me’ of course it will say something about Mr Coulson. But it will also say something [...]