Tony Blair’s A Journey: the highlights

The First Post skims through Tony Blair's memoir to bring you the best bits - like his alcohol 'problem' and how he identified with Princess Diana.  

BLAIR ON... IRAQStill no apology, but plenty of regrets. Of course, there has been much debate over Blair's decision to donate the proceeds of his book to the Royal British Legion. He writes: "I regret with every fibre of my being the loss of those who died."

"On the basis of what we do know now, I still believe that leaving Saddam in power was a bigger risk to our security than removing him and that, terrible though the aftermath was, the reality of Saddam and his sons in charge of Iraq would at least arguably be much worse.

"I am unable to satisfy the desire even of some of my supporters, who would like me to say: it was a mistake but one made in good faith. Friends opposed to the war think I'm being obstinate; others, less friendly, think I'm delusional. To both I may say: keep an open mind."

BLAIR ON... GEORGE BUSHThose same 'friends' (above) who think Blair is delusional will be amused by the glowing tribute he gives to the much-derided former US president:

"George had immense simplicity in how he saw the world. Right or wrong, it led to decisive leadership. I had come to like and admire George. I was asked recently which of the political leaders I had met had most integrity. I listed George near the top... He was, in a bizarre sense... a true idealist."

BLAIR ON... GORDON BROWNBlair accepts that his rival is brilliant and capable, admitting that whenever he thought of replacing his then Chancellor, he realised that Brown was the best man for the job - "head and shoulders above the others". However, he claims he knew that Brown, who has "zero emotional intelligence" and wasn't a "normal bloke", would be a disaster as Prime Minister.

"I won three general elections," he writes modestly. "The longest Labour government had lasted six years. This lasted 13. It could have gone on longer, had it not abandoned New Labour."

BLAIR ON... ALCOHOLBlair doesn't quite admit to having a problem, and many of his fellow Brits would consider him something of a lightweight in this department, but he says he used alcohol to cope with his fractious relationship with Brown:

"Stiff whisky or G&T before dinner, couple of glasses of wine or even half a bottle with it. So not excessively excessive. I had a limit. But I was aware that it had become a prop."

BLAIR ON... FOX HUNTINGBlair effectively admits to sabotaging the 2004 Hunting Act, which was supposed to ban fox hunting. Writing about the "primeval" passions aroused by the ban, Blair says: "If I'd proposed solving the pension problem by compulsory euthanasia for every fifth pensioner I'd have got less trouble. By the end of it, I felt like the damn fox."

In the end, the law passed was a "masterly British compromise" which Blair says allowed fox hunting to continue "provided certain steps were taken to avoid cruelty when the fox was killed".

Blair also reveals Prince Charles had bet him that people would still be hunting when he left office.

BLAIR ON... THE FINANCIAL CRISISGordon Brown was right to intervene to restructure the banks and introduce an economic stimulus after the credit crunch, but his subsequent actions were wrong. "The role of government is to stabilise and then get out of the way as quickly as economically sensible," says Blair.

And Brown was wrong to increase the top rate of tax. Blair says the New Labour solution would have been to increase VAT and other indirect taxes gradually ­ the so-called 'stealth tax' option for which his government was routinely criticised.

Blair¹s comments have been taken by some media commentators as proof that he approves of the new coalition government¹s approach to tackling the budget deficit.

BLAIR ON... PRINCESS DIANA"We were both, in our own way, manipulators," writes Blair about Princess Diana, whom he met before her death. "She captured the essence of an era and held it in her hand. She defined it... She was extraordinarily captivating."

Following Diana's death in a car accident in Paris, and the Queen's muted reaction to the public grief, Blair says he felt a duty to "protect the monarchy from itself" ­ a feeling that caused friction with the Queen. He writes that when he met the monarch, whom he did not yet know well, he "spoke, with passion, of the need to accept life's lessons".

The Queen was suspicious. "I worried she found me presumptuous," he said, adding: "She was a little haughty."

BLAIR ON... THE LIB-CON COALITIONBlair writes: "If Labour simply defaults to a 'Tory cutters, Lib Dem collaborators' mantra, it may well benefit in the short term.

"However, it will lose any possibility of being chosen as an alternative government. Instead, it has to stand up for its record in the many areas it can do so, but also explain where the criticism of the 13 years is valid. It should criticise the composition, but not the thrust of the Tory deficit reductions."

He calls the Lib-Con coalition the "Tory version of New Labour".

BLAIR ON... FREEDOM OF INFORMATIONTony Blair believes the Freedom of Information Act, which among other things can be directly credited with leading to the MPs' expenses scandal, is "not practical for good government".
 
He told the Guardian in an interview to plug his book today: "If you are trying to take a difficult decision and you're weighing up the pros and cons, you have frank conversations. If those conversations then are put out in a published form that afterwards are liable to be highlighted in particular ways, you are going to be very cautious. That's why it's not a sensible thing."

BLAIR ON... THE MILIBANDSIn today's interview with the Guardian, Blair refuses to be drawn. "I don't want to get into the business of making formal endorsements and so on," he says. But commentators agree that by criticising Brown for jettisoning New Labour in A Journey, he implicitly recommends David Miliband over his brother Ed. Warning against a shift to the left, Blair writes: "If we do, we will lose even bigger next time." ·