A Journey_ My Political Life Part 25

I could see all the practical problems. I could envisage that it might take time. The civil liberties argument I thought a little absurd, I confess many well-functioning democracies have ident.i.ty cards, and the information stored is less than most supermarkets have. However, the clincher for me is and was a technical one. Due to new technology, it is now possible through fingerprint and iris scans to create a card that is extremely difficult to replicate, so the chance of fraud or ident.i.ty abuse is therefore hugely diminished. It was the combination of changing ways of living and changing technology that convinced me that this was correct.

After a bit of toing and froing, the Tories came out against it, once more, in my view, mistakenly.

Gordon had multiple good arguments against ID cards, since practicality and cost were genuine issues. His argument against antisocial behaviour legislation was one which once again he was given by the people advising him. He had his own pollsters and unfortunately they used to give him unbelievably duff advice on occasions. Their argument here was that immigration and law and order issues were only of great salience because we insisted on talking about them. David, in particular, was accused of inciting the issues rather than responding to them.

I treated this with some wonderment. You only had to travel the country for half an hour to realise these issues were very real and very live, and the idea that they would melt away if we only stopped focusing on them was utterly crazy. On the contrary, the only thing that prevented them from capsizing us was that we were talking and acting on them. Of course, nothing we did was enough; but doing nothing as a response was plainly a thousand times worse.

In this area, though, there was less of a Treasury locus and so the opposition was, if not muted, unable to obstruct much.

But I'm afraid you get the general picture: I was pressing forward; Gordon was resisting. The whole thing was enervating and depressing. So not for the first or last time, I came back to the central dilemma: how to deal with it?

By then, even more so than 2001, removing Gordon would have brought the entire building tumbling down around our ears. He had ma.s.sive support in the party and had backing among powerful people in the media. As I fell out with Paul Dacre of the Daily Mail Daily Mail, he had fallen in with him. Rupert Murdoch liked Gordon. As Iraq divided me from the left papers, his own relations.h.i.+p with them blossomed. Serious people rated him, and for perfectly good reasons: he was an excellent Chancellor, he had a towering intellect, he had immense, even incredible energy and drive. He was a problem for me; but he wasn't a significant problem to anyone else well, some of the other Cabinet ministers maybe, but none were at that point powerful enough to take him on, even with me. He was also careful enough, as always, to put resistance on a Treasury and not an anti-reform footing.

Besides, for all the resistance, the effect was to slow down and sometimes water down the process, but not to stop it. Each reform painful though it was got through. Manifestly it would have been easier and less painful if it had been done with his support; but he was a brake, not a brick wall.

The alternative to removing him was the one I chose: to try to reach one last understanding with him; to try to rea.s.sure him that if he and I cooperated, if we truly shared the same agenda, I would go before the election and hand over to him.

It was unwise because it was never going to work. It was almost certainly unwise also to use John Prescott as the go-between. I say this not because John was badly intentioned on the contrary, he was only motivated by what he believed was good for the Labour Party but the trouble was he thought the policy differences between us were immaterial. He thought it was essentially personal. Because John had his own deep reservations about New Labour, they blinded him to the fact that the differences went to the heart of what New Labour was about.

To me, at least, though I was of course at points angry and dismayed at Gordon's behaviour, it really wasn't personal. The thing that mattered most was getting the New Labour programme through, proving that the Labour Party was indeed the party that could, because it had changed, change the public services and welfare state it had helped create; change them radically, make them secure because we had made them modern, right for the twenty-first century, right for a world that was an era away from 1945 in its thinking. I saw this as the supreme fulfilment of my mission: to show how progressive politics, itself modernised, could modernise the nation; to escape from Labour's hide-bound and time-bound fixation with its past, and in doing so help the country escape from theirs. I thought I could see where Thatcherism was right and where it was severely and dangerously limited. I also believed and this belief increased over time that a new politics was opening up in which traditional distinctions between left and right were not so much blurred as often profoundly unhelpful in a.n.a.lysing either the past or the future.

Was it reasonable for him to block measures simply because I would not yield to him the position of prime minister? Of course not. But then look at it from his point of view: constantly waiting; constantly fretting that I might sacrifice all political goodwill before the crown was his; constantly fearing the pa.s.sage of time.

Look at it from my point of view: by late 2004, I would have done more than seven years. The job had taken its toll. Iraq and September 11 had taken their toll. The fight with him had taken its toll. Peter gone, Alastair gone, Anji gone. The shadows had grown larger and darker.

Suppose I am the block to his a.s.sumption not just of the position but also of his destiny? Suppose once he gets it, he changes, he relaxes, he breaks open the sh.e.l.l and takes wing? Surely what matters is the programme. Surely if he completes it after I have begun it, that is to the credit of us both. So if he will only agree to carry it through, why not put the burden down, get out, escape? Imagine the relief. Imagine the freedom. Contemplate a new life without that strain, stress and struggle. One that allows me to think; allows me to build; to study the religious philosophy that fascinates me, and then perhaps to build something even more important than what I was able to build in politics.

It was a delusion, of course. Worse, it was an act of cowardice. I was worn down. Simple as that. Prosaic as that. Nothing grand about it. Nothing elevated. Not really to do with destiny, his or mine. Just born of the normal weakness of a normal person.

In November 2003 we had agreed to meet at John's flat in Admiralty House. A previous meeting down at Dorneywood had been pretty stormy and inconclusive. The vote on tuition fees was only weeks away and it remained very tight. My office were adamantly opposed to me having the dinner with John and Gordon. They guessed where it would lead. It wasn't so much that they didn't trust John or thought he was against me; they just thought that he thought we were interchangeable when we weren't, and therefore they didn't trust his instincts.

I walked across Horse Guards Parade in Whitehall. It was a cold evening and the square was just about empty. I went in the side door and made my way up to the flat in the lift. It was a good-size apartment and well furnished, but as with all these grace-and-favour places, always to my mind a little anaemic. John and Pauline's home in Hull the old Salvation Army hostel had much more character. But the flat was comfortable and convenient.

I had a drink with John and we waited for Gordon, who came a little late. We sat down to dinner immediately. It was a rough conversation. After a time I asked John to leave to let us talk. I told Gordon bluntly of my concern: I was prepared to go as I had often said, I had only wanted to do two terms but the constant obstruction and wilful blocking of the reform programme had to stop. He denied, as ever, that he was obstructing, only really raising legitimate financial points. I said I needed to know that he would be one hundred per cent committed to the reform programme and would carry it through after I left. He said of course he would. John came back in. I said: I have made it clear I won't serve a third term and will go before an election, but I need Gordon's full and unconditional support. John said he thought that was sensible. We parted.

I have put it down baldly. He would say: I received an a.s.surance Tony would go. I would say: I received an a.s.surance Gordon would cooperate and carry through the agenda. You can then debate who kept his word and who didn't.

Unfortunately, I have come in time to a different view. It was an a.s.surance that should never have been asked or given. It was not our right to apportion power like that. Not our right. Not wise. Not sensible politically, let alone democratically.

But more than that, there was an obvious flaw at the heart of it. To demand I give up the office in order to agree the programme is, if you think about it, a disqualification for the office. Whatever leaders.h.i.+p is, that is the opposite of it. Likewise, to yield to the demand is an act of deep expedience. Now, I didn't know what else to do. But the feelings on his part of ent.i.tlement which should never enter into a discussion of the office of prime minister because no one is 'ent.i.tled' burgeoned still further from that moment on. Maybe he would have got there anyway. Maybe he should have. But never through ent.i.tlement bestowed on one holder of the office by another.

I don't mean to make any grandiose point about democracy. There are frequent occasions in which a prime minister has a chosen successor. The point I make is more a political one; it's just a thoroughly bad method to make the choice.

Of course the obvious question, and one repeatedly put by friends and occasionally even by foes, is why didn't I sack Gordon. A perfectly legitimate question with no very obvious answer.

Sometimes my close staff would say to me: You don't owe him what you think you owe him; your past friends.h.i.+p shouldn't stand in the way.

But it was neither obligation nor friends.h.i.+p that stopped me. It was that I still disagreed with the premise that his absence from government was better than his presence within it. Given the nature of some of his behaviour, especially towards the end, that might seem an extraordinary thing to say. The answer to the question, 'Would life have been easier if he was removed?' seems so clear; however, the answer a.s.sumes that had he been sacked, everything else would have remained the same: i.e. it would have been the same world, minus Gordon.

That's not how politics works.

In the end, a political leader has both to manage complex situations and to judge them. Gordon might be said to have been such a complex situation, and he had to be managed. And there is a crucial difference between political management and running, say, a company or a football team. A conversation I used to have with Alex Ferguson pinpointed this. 'What would you do if you had a really difficult but brilliant player causing you problems?' I would ask. 'Get rid of them,' he would reply. 'And supposing after you got rid of them they were still in the dressing room, and in the squad?' I would say. 'That would be a different matter,' he would reply, laughing.

Gordon had enormous support within the party and the media. He was regarded by many as a great Chancellor, and by nearly all as a strong one. When it's said that I should have sacked him, or demoted him, this takes no account of the fact that had I done so, the party and the government would have been severely and immediately destabilised, and his ascent to the office of prime minister would probably have been even faster. By 2004, but possibly well before then, the media left and right would have insisted that I had acted spitefully and wrongly. It is easy to say now, in the light of his tenure as prime minister, that I should have stopped it; at the time that would have been well nigh impossible. I would have had barely any support in any influential quarter for doing so; and some of those most critical of Gordon now, were singing a quite different tune then.

However, that is not the reason I didn't do it. If I had decided he really was unfit to remain as Chancellor I would have dismissed him, even if it had hastened my own dismissal. My failure to do so was not a lack of courage. Nor was it simply about managing a complex situation. It was because I believed, despite it all, despite my own feelings at times, that he was the best Chancellor for the country.

I formed this judgement for two reasons. First, just as during the time when Gordon sheltered beneath my umbrella as prime minister the benign view of him was misguided in his favour, so now it is misguided to underestimate his huge strengths. The truth is that every time I considered who might replace him, I concluded he was still the best for the job. He gave the government ballast, solidity and strength. Many of his interventions were excellent, especially at an international level. At his best, his intellect and energy were vast and beneficial to the country. When, sometime in 2001, I think, there was talk of him taking an international job of some description, I reflected and decided the government would be weaker and not stronger without him.

Later, when I ran through possible replacements, I still b.u.mped up against the same uncomfortable but I thought incontrovertible reality. He was head and shoulders above the others. Only towards the very end did the thoroughgoing New Labour people start to emerge who had sufficient seniority and experience to have taken his place.

The second reason was that, though Gordon resisted many of the reforms and slowed some of them down, he didn't prevent them. We did them. By the time I left, choice and compet.i.tion were embedded in the NHS; academies were powering ahead; the crime bills had pa.s.sed; tuition fees were in place; and welfare and pension reforms were formulated, if not introduced. These weren't small items. They were major changes. In the final a.n.a.lysis he supported them. He wouldn't have initiated them; but when it came to the crunch, he went along. They got through. And herein lies a lesson. There is a reason, apart from the princ.i.p.al one of New Labour, why the government I led was the first Labour government to win even two successive full terms, let alone three; and why it governed for more than double the length of the previous longest-serving Labour government. This is the part that even my closest advisers never understood; but as I used to tease them, these judgements are why I'm the leader and you're not!

Ultimately, though the relentless personal pressure from Gordon was wearing, it actually troubled me far less than they (or perhaps he) ever realised. And it was in many ways a far less toxic and deadly opposition than might have been the case.

Because Gordon was the standard-bearer for dissent, his banner the one to which the internal critics naturally gathered, the natural opposition that progressive politics always contains was kept within bounds. Put him out and one of two things would have happened: either he would have been in a position, and long before ten years, to mount a successful challenge (or at least a challenge that would have been terminal in its consequences); or another banner, probably more to the left, possibly more destructive to the party's long-term health, would have arisen. I came to the conclusion that having him inside and constrained was better than outside and let loose or, worse, becoming the figurehead of a far more damaging force well to the left.

So was he difficult, at times maddening? Yes. But he was also strong, capable and brilliant, and those were qualities for which I never lost respect.

There was another interesting factor that occurred to me. I had always taken the view that Margaret Thatcher, great prime minister though she was, should never have stood in the way of Michael Heseltine becoming leader. It was her determination to stop him that made her withdraw from the leaders.h.i.+p contest following the challenge to her, and allow John Major to win. Heseltine had many flaws, but he was a big figure and would have been a far more potent force to deal with. He may also have stopped the Eurosceptic virus from taking over the Tories. So I always took the view that she allowed personal preference to stand in the way of her party's true interests.

I was set upon not repeating that mistake. I would be big enough to put aside personal bitterness and not stand in Gordon's way. In so doing, I just made the same mistake differently. I too tried to choose my successor, and by the time I realised the choice was mistaken, it was too late.

However, it did buy me peace. After the dinner, Gordon and I began talking again properly. Though it came about rather tortuously, by degrees he got George Mudie of the Treasury Select Committee and Nick Brown to stand down their opposition. We won the tuition-fee vote. The Hutton Report concluded favourably.

In my own mind, I became more settled. I told no one in the office that I had agreed to stand down if Gordon cooperated, but naturally they guessed. Rather sensibly, instead of pus.h.i.+ng back they just let matters take their course. Jonathan and Sally in particular were confident it wouldn't happen. They understood my desire to leave, but thought it inconceivable that I would conclude that Gordon shared the same agenda. They were completely sure he didn't.

Meanwhile, events crowded in on us as thick and fast as ever. In March 2004, there were the terror attacks in Madrid, timed for the Spanish general election. Almost two hundred people died and over 2,000 were injured. It was a stark reminder that the terrorist movement remained alive and kicking. The memories of September 11 had dimmed, despite events such as the 2002 Bali bombings. The anti-terror laws pa.s.sed in the first flush of fear after the attack in New York were now subject to a steady drumbeat of opposition from those who felt them inconsistent with Britain's liberties. I was continually conscious of the fact that the terrorists would love to strike at Britain. We had more or less regular updates and briefings and were watching numerous cells of activity.

In May, ten countries entered the EU. We had been staunch advocates of enlargement. It was a big moment. The Const.i.tution for the EU had been agreed. With deep misgivings, I accepted we had to promise a referendum on it. We wouldn't get the Const.i.tution through the House of Lords without it, and even the Commons vote would have been in doubt. My statement met with predictably and justifiably raucous cheering from Tories, who knew my heart wasn't in it.

Jacques Chirac was also aggrieved as he felt it presented him with a real problem. In this, he was right. If Britain promised a referendum, it put enormous pressure on France to do the same. But truthfully, I couldn't avoid it, and as Jack Straw insistently advocated, better to do it apparently willingly than be forced to do it by a vote. However, it reminded me how far I had to go to persuade British opinion of the merits of being in the mainstream of Europe. As ever, the difficulty was that the Eurosceptics were organised and had savage media backing; those in favour of a constructive att.i.tude were disorganised and had the usual progressive media 'backing', i.e. spending more time criticising their own side than reb.u.t.ting the propaganda of the other.

For all that, though, we remained reasonably strong in Europe. We chose our battles carefully. I went out of my way to construct alliances that protected us against any potential French/German st.i.tch-up, and, despite a profound disagreement over Iraq, kept lines open to Chirac and Schroeder.

Gerhard Schroeder was a really tough cookie. Despite falling out over foreign policy, I generally admired his radicalism in domestic policy reform, sympathised with his problems with Oskar Lafontaine, his former Finance Minister who was now parked strongly on his left and soon to start a new party, and I thought Gerhard had real leaders.h.i.+p qualities.

As I say elsewhere, my motivation for bringing Britain into the centre of Europe is nothing to do with starry-eyed idealism, though I happen to share the European ideal; it is about naked national self-interest. In time, and a time fast approaching, no European nation, not even Germany, will be large enough to withstand pressure from the really big nations unless we bond together. United, we are strong. Divided, we are not only weak, but we also unbalance the geopolitical power game. Europe can play a role positioned not between but alongside the US and China, India, Russia, Brazil and the other emerging powers. In that role it can do a lot, not only for itself but also for the equilibrium of international politics. But if Europe's countries are played off against each other and major powers are swift to spot that opportunity the downside is felt not just by us but by the international community as a whole.

So all this was going on, along with the usual flotsam and jetsam: the campaign group Fathers 4 Justice threw a condom filled with purple flour at me during Prime Minister's Questions (it was the shortest PMQs I ever did, and much was I grateful); Ken Livingstone was re-elected as mayor of London, and England got knocked out of the Euro 2004 football compet.i.tion on penalties. For a moment, the eye of the media beast was distracted and some semblance of normality reigned. I appointed Peter Mandelson as the new EU commissioner, despite intense internal opposition from parts of the PLP and Cabinet. We lost one seat to the Lib Dems and narrowly held on to another against them in two by-elections. We had a heavy but not utterly disastrous defeat in the local elections. The by-election in Peter's seat was won.

Our political position seemed fragile, but in reality we remained strong. The Tories never won a by-election from us during my time as leader. I should have taken more heart from all of that than I did. As Peter used to say to me, but I never quite accepted, 'You are far stronger than you think.'

In the course of the first part of 2004, we had proceeded with the next stage of the reform plans. We now had on the books a schools programme that included greater freedom for schools but also the first embryonic academies; variable tuition fees, modelled on the US system; NHS hospital trusts and the first foundation hospitals and again the beginnings of private sector compet.i.tion; asylum reform; antisocial behaviour legislation; a new system of early-years learning in childcare; and work under way on pensions, welfare and ID cards.

The aim now was to construct a clear forward agenda to take all these changes to a new, sustained and pervasive level. The changes so far had shown clearly that the greater the autonomy for schools and hospitals, the greater the innovation; the more choice and compet.i.tion, the higher the quality of outcomes; and especially with the NHS, cuts in waiting times were all coming from the combination of the system being open to private sector investment and money increasingly following the patient; and the only problem with the law and order changes was that people wanted them to go faster and further.

In summary, extra money plus system change delivered results. Through 2004 and after seven years in power, we were finally getting real and substantial improvements. The Delivery Unit set up by Michael Barber after the 2001 election was producing big dividends. Along with the Strategy Unit, it had been a major innovation. It had been harshly criticised and remained subject to fairly continual sniping from the traditional Civil Service, but Michael and his relatively small team of around thirty were making a quant.i.tative and qualitative difference to the performance of government.

As Michael explains in his book Instruction to Deliver Instruction to Deliver which has become something of a public sector hallowed text round the world for the first time we were tracking priority commitments, receiving real-time data on how they were proceeding and following up so that obstacles were removed and policies adjusted as necessary. Most of all, those charged with delivering knew they were being monitored. It was not a heavy process. Michael's consummate skill was to make performance management seem, and indeed be, a partners.h.i.+p. It was highly effective. which has become something of a public sector hallowed text round the world for the first time we were tracking priority commitments, receiving real-time data on how they were proceeding and following up so that obstacles were removed and policies adjusted as necessary. Most of all, those charged with delivering knew they were being monitored. It was not a heavy process. Michael's consummate skill was to make performance management seem, and indeed be, a partners.h.i.+p. It was highly effective.

By this time, I felt things were really moving but, as I say, we now needed to take it all to the next stage. So we began work on a series of five-year plans, to be published at the end of the summer session. The aim was to give the party a solid, radical New Labour platform on which to win a third term. Of course, critical to this was to ensure that Number 10 and Number 11 were working closely on it, so we began the sessions to try to take it forward.

Meanwhile, I prepared for the likely departure. Cherie and I had been out of the London housing market since 1997, during which time prices had rocketed. With the help of Martha Greene, a friend, we began discreetly to look for a house. It's not an easy thing to do without being discovered, but Martha handled it all with great skill and we identified a house in Connaught Square which would allow us to keep Leo at the Westminster primary school where he was very happy.

I was reasonably settled in my own mind that two terms was enough. I had, as I explained, taken the decision over Iraq in good faith. Right or wrong, I tried to do what I thought was in the best interests of the country. But the coming together of a right-wing media that wanted me out because I could win for Labour and a left-wing media that was genuinely outraged by war led to a campaign that tested even my resilience and fort.i.tude. You should get used to being criticised as prime minister. Being vilified was a little different. I am not by nature a whiner; but inside I was starting to whine.

Worn down is, again, how I would describe it. It's hard to express what it's like. Naturally, it is a great privilege and honour to do the job and by the way, it really is! but here's where my greatest strength was my greatest weakness: I am normal. Faced with a choice between a thriller with plenty of action and special effects, where in the end the hero triumphs, and a psychological drama about a dying wife who discovers her husband has been having a pa.s.sionate affair with her best friend, her only child commits suicide and who then dies in solitude and penury, I go for the first. Ask me whether I would prefer to eat out at a good restaurant with friends talking about anything other than politics or sit through Wagner's Gotterdammerung Gotterdammerung and you would find me in the restaurant. Like most of humanity I prefer laughing to crying, enjoyment to mourning, feeling up to feeling down. My natural disposition is to wake up looking forward to the day ahead. and you would find me in the restaurant. Like most of humanity I prefer laughing to crying, enjoyment to mourning, feeling up to feeling down. My natural disposition is to wake up looking forward to the day ahead.

And I found I wasn't. Of course, sometimes life is more like a psychological drama than a thriller; Wagner's opera can provoke more reflection than a casual night out with friends; and tears are more appropriate than laughter. There were many tears being shed as a result of my decisions, so why should I not share them? Indeed, how could I not share them?

The euphoria, the boundless optimism of the early years had long dissipated. Instead, each day, each meeting, occasionally each hour seemed a struggle, an endless pus.h.i.+ng up against forces, seen or unseen, that pushed back sometimes steadily, sometimes violently, but always with what seemed like inexhaustible energy and often malice.

So when does fatigue turn to self-pity, and to surrender? I was very aware that these feelings were gripping me. I accepted the first, despised the other two, but could feel my will ebbing and my resistance faltering. And I had told Gordon I would go if he carried through the same agenda. So that gave me my reason (or was it excuse?) to go. Whatever, I wanted out.

I talked about it with Cherie. She thought I was wrong to go, but made it clear she would support my decision. But, as she could be at critical moments, she forced me to be honest about why I wanted to go. She told me bluntly I was kidding myself if I thought Gordon shared the same programme. 'You just want out,' she said. 'I understand why. In many ways, so do I. But let's be honest about it.'

I wasn't sure she was right about Gordon. I had thought it possible he might go with the agenda once he owned it. And there was another reason motivating me, concerning the Labour Party. In modern politics, to go two terms is a big achievement; I did ten years, which must be the maximum nowadays. In earlier times, when the pace of politics was slower and the leader was far less visible, less scrutinised and criticised, you could go for three or four. Today, a new prime minister or president becomes almost boringly familiar to people even after a year. By year eight, they've had enough. Actually, you've had enough.

We had put in an offer on the house. It had been accepted. My feeling at that point was to announce around conference time that I would go, and be out by Christmas. That would leave a good six-month run-in for the election for Gordon.

However, the work on the five-year plans was now running into serious difficulties. The trouble is that once you declare an intention that you are going to go, even if only to yourself in your own mind, it seeps out as if by osmosis.

Also, one stipulation I had made with John Prescott and Gordon was that neither should mention my departure, not even to their closest staff. In particular, I had said to Gordon he must not on any account discuss this with the two Eds, b.a.l.l.s and Miliband. I permitted him to tell Sue Nye and I told Anji (who was of course no longer working for me), but that was it. In spite of this, he had actually told his inner circle as a whole.

This was a real problem. I had set up the possibility of my going by saying to the Guardian Guardian that if I felt I was a liability to the Labour Party then I would leave. That was as far as I wanted to go if my leaving became current and imminent, then self-evidently all authority would evaporate. But articles were now appearing discussing the possibility of my departure, with some even saying it was all agreed. that if I felt I was a liability to the Labour Party then I would leave. That was as far as I wanted to go if my leaving became current and imminent, then self-evidently all authority would evaporate. But articles were now appearing discussing the possibility of my departure, with some even saying it was all agreed.

I resented this, but in the end I suppose it was inevitable he would talk to his people, and he would say he needed to plan. Actually, the reason for my change of mind was not to do with that.

The reason I started to draw back was to do with the ongoing discussions with the Treasury. Matthew Taylor and Jeremy Heywood, who were conducting them on behalf of Number 10, were saying in effect that it was completely clear there was no way that Ed b.a.l.l.s, in particular, was supportive of this programme. Other Treasury officials were talking of me and describing how as one put it 'It's all a bit pointless anyway as he's not going to be there.'

This had been filtering back to me in dribs and drabs, and then one day in May, Matthew had a quiet word with me. 'You do know there is not the slightest possibility of them running with these five-year plans, don't you?' He also told me they were contemplating significant alterations to the tuition-fees reforms.

I decided to have it out with Gordon, and we met later that month. I told him that we were having serious worries that this agenda wasn't in line with his thinking. It was then that he miscalculated.

I'm sure I never quite handled him right in tense situations. Maybe we knew each other too well, and like some quarrelling, married couple we let emotion run out on the pitch before thinking. But on this occasion he made a grievous error: he should have rea.s.sured me, and instead he tried to bully me. He snarled when he should have charmed.

In effect, he said: you've promised to go and that's that. That was completely the wrong tactic, and I became very tough in response. He then altered and said of course we agreed the agenda, refuting that Ed b.a.l.l.s was anything other than one hundred per cent in favour of it, and also denying that he had told Ed anything about my going. I knew both things were wrong.

The meeting ended badly. But worse, the hostility started up again almost immediately. They had decided to force the issue. It was the stupidest thing it forced me to confront or yield. And if I yielded, what word could I utter when I looked in the mirror except 'coward'?

At the end of June I went to a NATO meeting in Istanbul, where I recall getting the first headlines from the British papers from David Hill. Normally, and mercifully, David showed me little of the media. As he put it, 'I show you this stuff on a "need to know" basis.' He was a consummate operator with really excellent political judgement, calm, a.s.sured and as good a suffocator of a febrile story as there was. And there were plenty to suffocate, as you can imagine. The papers were full of what was obviously, and almost openly, a GB press operation arising out of critical comments which Derek Scott, my former economic adviser, had made about Gordon. Derek had by then left Downing Street. Although a really good and freethinking adviser, he had been 'independent' (i.e. uncontrollable) enough when he worked in Number 10; outside it, there was no hope of keeping him 'on message'. Anyone knew that. Gordon knew that. But Derek's comments were hyped and presented as an attack on Gordon as if authorised by me, which was absurd. It saw the start of a 'Gordon as victim' line which ran pretty constantly from then until I left.

'What do we do?' said David.

'Nothing,' I replied, 'except make it clear we are fully supportive of Gordon and don't share Derek's views.'

I left Istanbul, went on to the Special EU Council, and came back to London on 30 June to make a statement on both the NATO and the EU meetings. It had been an incredibly busy month. The week before we had had the ordinary EU Council. The week before that, we had had the G8 summit at Sea Island in Georgia. I had been more or less continually on the go, with barely time to think on Gordon. But I could feel the pressure building and getting uglier by the day.

I did the usual Thursday Cabinet, held various other meetings and then went to Chequers on the Friday. I used to entertain there sporadically, and had leaders there when it was unavoidable, or when discretion and secrecy were paramount (as in some of the Irish talks); but on the whole Chequers was a place for relaxation and reflection. I've always found the two go together.

In the summer I could sit out on the terrace, ploughing through the box papers, stopping every so often for a mug of tea or to take a call. I used to have a light lunch with nothing to drink, watch Football Focus Football Focus if it was a Sat.u.r.day and pretend I was a pundit, or a live game if it was on at midday, work a little more and then go to the gym. In the early days I might go off to RAF Halton and play tennis. if it was a Sat.u.r.day and pretend I was a pundit, or a live game if it was on at midday, work a little more and then go to the gym. In the early days I might go off to RAF Halton and play tennis.

On this weekend, I sat and thought long and hard. I came to one inescapable conclusion, and then another. The first was that I didn't really believe Gordon would carry on the agenda. The truth is: if he believed in it, he would have supported it. And you can tell a lot from the people around someone; those around Gordon didn't agree with it. OK, they might be cajoled into it, even pressed into it, but once I was gone there was no earthly hope of the fledgling programme being pursued.

The second conclusion was that the only reason I wanted to go was cowardice, pure and simple. I could try to dress it up in grand gestures of selflessness, pretend that I would be going for the good of the party or country, or even family; but it wouldn't wash. That motive was not selfless but selfish. I would be going because I couldn't take it any more, the abuse, the pressure, the hounding, the misrepresentation of my motives, the denigration. The kitchen temperature had become too high; I was sweating.

Also, I now knew what would be coming after me. It would not exactly be Old Labour, but it wouldn't be authentic New Labour either. Very soon we would be back to conventional Labour versus conventional Tory. And there would be only one winner from that.

A couple of weeks before, in a rare break from the helter-skelter, John Reid had come to see me. John is a very wise man. Once he broke the grip the demon drink had on him, he flourished into one of the most shrewd and profound politicians in any party. Had he come through earlier, he could have played a huge part in keeping Labour as New Labour.

We had sat out on the wicker chairs in the Downing Street garden. As was his wont, he was very direct.

'You must not go,' he said. I began to protest but he waved me silent. 'I know you're thinking about it. It would be the most terrible mistake not only for you but for the party and the country. You must not do it. You know as well as I do what Gordon will be like. He may become leader some day, he may not; but to hand over now would be irresponsible. What is more, you need to fight the election even after Iraq, even with its burden, and you need to win it. And if you don't, however you may present it, you are running away.'

As I sat in the gentle July suns.h.i.+ne at Chequers in 2004, I realised not that John had persuaded me Tessa Jowell, Alan Milburn, Peter Mandelson and others had made the same argument but rather that he had brought my own thoughts out from under the cover of my fantasy and illuminated them. It would be tough to stay, even at points horrible; but it would be a failure of simple, basic courage to go.

The British people, whom I genuinely adored and with whom the political relations.h.i.+p, at least on my part, was on occasions almost like a love affair, had ceased loving and were not going to start again. Support remained, but many were sullen, even resentful. The enjoyment that remained was the joy of doing what I believed in wholeheartedly, winning a third term, forcing the Tories therefore to change, and seeing through a programme of domestic reform that I was sure was right. Iraq would be a severe headwind; but I was again sure that whatever the wisdom of doing it, the folly of retreat was unthinkable and precipitate withdrawal a disaster. I looked as dispa.s.sionately as I could at our programme, and at that of the Tories under Michael Howard, and I didn't really have any doubt as to what was sensible for Britain. But our winning depended vitally on us remaining clearly and unashamedly New Labour. If we s.h.i.+fted from it, even deviated from it at the margins, I knew we would be finished.

My mind was made up. I could not hand over to Gordon, at least not at this time and quite possibly never. The following week I informed him. You can guess the reaction. I took back the management of the five-year plans. We just worked with departments, and worked round and despite the Treasury. We got the plans in proper radical shape, and they became the basis of the third-term manifesto. After a good two weeks' holiday, I came back fully refreshed.

In my conference address, I set out our stall for the third term. Previously, Alastair and Peter Hyman would supply a draft speech, something they excelled at. I would then amend and re-amend, usually over ten or fifteen drafts. They would tend to pull one way ideologically, Anji and Jonathan the other. Over time, starting with the 2001 speech, I would do the draft myself. Peter and Alastair would write certain key pa.s.sages or be commissioned to give the speech colour. The others would give a view. Meanwhile, David Hill would point out pitfalls or unintended headlines. Matthew Taylor and Andrew Adonis would look after policy. Sally Morgan would comment.

I made the case for what we had done, and what we still had to do. As always, I tried to unite traditional values with an a.n.a.lysis of the future world in which they had to be applied. I also attempted to settle the party with their new status, not as the underdog allowed to govern only occasionally, but as a party able to govern for a substantial period.

At the end of the conference I had another situation to handle. The previous year I had suffered arrhythmia for the first time, a heart condition that means that the top part of the heart can start to beat out of sync with the bottom part. It then causes an irregular heartbeat, breathlessness and a feeling of being tired. If untreated, it can cause a stroke (yes a stroke, strangely enough, rather than a heart attack). It had been treated by a process which essentially jump-starts the heart back into rhythm.

In the summer of 2004 I had noticed that the arrhythmia had come back. The recurrence had left me short of breath (it was most apparent in the gym and I realised something was wrong). This time the doctors said I should have a surgical procedure known as an ablation, which effectively burns off the bit of the heart that is short-circuiting. Anyway, don't ask me to debate the medical details; I just asked for the advice, got it and took it. The date for the operation was set for straight after party conference.

Gordon was still in a highly dangerous mood. In his conference speech he had gone out of his way to extol the merits of 'Real Labour'. It was, of course, a mistake, but it was also an ominous signal to the party. I felt I had to deal with the leaders.h.i.+p issue.

Against much advice, I resolved to say I would fight the next election but not the one after. Many people thought it fatal ever to say when you may stand down. I pointed out that this was the view Margaret Thatcher took, and a fat lot of good it did her. Past a certain point, you're d.a.m.ned either way. Say you are going, and they say: Why stay? Say you will carry on without limit, and they say: You intend to go on forever. There is no easy way.

I decided to throw so much at the media that they wouldn't quite know what to make of it all, and I gave them three stories at once: I would fight the third election but not the fourth; I had bought a house; I was having a heart operation. It was the only way to do it and I was highly amused by the spluttering and reeling as they tried to work out the 'true' significance of the stories being released simultaneously, since of course it wouldn't do simply to report the three things as they were. David Hill handled it brilliantly. I had my operation. The house was bought. And so was some time.

SEVENTEEN.

2005: TB/GB.

The 2005 election was ugly: fraught in its build-up; marred in its running by internal disputes; vicious in the nature of the campaign; and precarious in its aftermath. I didn't look forward to it. I didn't enjoy doing it. But we won. Looking back on a majority of more than sixty over all the other parties combined, it seems like a minor miracle. Which, in one sense, it was.