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Tony Blair Quotes
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Anthony Charles Lynton Blair 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 previously served as Leader of the Opposition before becoming Prime Minister and remains the last British Labour Party leader to have won a general election.

From 1983 to 2007, Blair was the Member of Parliament for Sedgefield. He was elected Labour Party leader in July 1994, following the sudden death of his predecessor, John Smith. Under Blair's leadership, the party used the phrase "New Labour", to distance it from previous Labour policies and the traditional conception of socialism. Blair declared support for a new conception that he referred to as "social-ism", involving politics that recognised individuals as socially interdependent, and advocated social justice, cohesion, the equal worth of each citizen, and equal opportunity, also referred to as the Third Way. Critics of Blair denounced him for bringing the Labour Party towards the perceived centre ground of British politics, abandoning 'genuine' socialism and being too amenable to capitalism. Supporters, including the party's public opinion pollster Philip Gould, stated that the Labour Party had to demonstrate that it had made a decisive break from its left-wing past, in order to win an election again.In May 1997, the Labour Party won a landslide general election victory, the largest in its history. Blair, at 43 years of age, became the youngest Prime Minister since 1812. In September 1997, Blair attained early personal popularity, receiving a 93% public approval rating, after his public response to the death of Diana, Princess of Wales. The Labour Party went on to win two more general elections under his leadership: in 2001, in which it won another landslide victory, and in 2005, with a greatly reduced majority. During his first term as Prime Minister, his government oversaw a large increase in public spending and introduced the National Minimum Wage Act, Human Rights Act, and Freedom of Information Act. His government also held referendums in which the Scottish and Welsh electorates voted in favour of devolved administration. In Northern Ireland, Blair was involved in negotiating the Good Friday Agreement.

Blair supported the foreign policy of the George W. Bush administration, and ensured that the British Armed Forces participated in the 2001 invasion of Afghanistan and, more controversially, the 2003 invasion of Iraq. Blair has faced criticism for his role in the invasion of Iraq, including calls for having him tried for war crimes and waging a war of aggression; in 2016, the Iraq Inquiry criticised his actions and described the invasion as unjustified and unnecessary.Blair was succeeded as Leader of the Labour Party and as Prime Minister by Gordon Brown in June 2007. On the day that Blair resigned as Prime Minister, he was appointed the official Special Envoy of the Quartet on the Middle East, an office which he held until May 2015. He currently runs the Tony Blair Institute for Global Change.

✵ 6. May 1953
Tony Blair photo
Tony Blair: 75   quotes 1   like

Tony Blair Quotes

“There have been the most terrible, shocking events taking place in the United States of America within the last hour or so, including two hijacked planes being flown deliberately into the World Trade Center. I am afraid we can only imagine the terror and the carnage there and the many, many innocent people who will have lost their lives. I know that you would want to join with me in sending the deepest condolences to President Bush and to the American people on behalf of the British people at these terrible events.This mass terrorism is the new evil in our world today. It is perpetrated by fanatics who are utterly indifferent to the sanctity of human life and we, the democracies of this world, are going to have to come together to fight it together and eradicate this evil completely from our world.”

Tony Blair

Trades Union Congress http://www.tuc.org.uk/congress/tuc-3709-f0.cfm
Speech to the Trades Union Congress. 11 September 2001, shortly after the terrorist attacks of that day had begun.
2000s

Life , People , World , Democracy

“Don't say yes to that question, that would be difficult.”

Tony Blair

CNN.com http://edition.cnn.com/2004/US/11/12/allies/
At a joint press conference with George W. Bush, 13 November 2004. Blair interrupted when a reporter asked Bush if he sees Blair as his poodle.
2000s

Question

“[The Joint Intelligence Committee] concludes that Iraq has chemical and biological weapons, that Saddam has continued to produce them, that he has existing and active military plans for the use of chemical and biological weapons, which could be activated within 45 minutes, including against his own Shia population, and that he is actively trying to acquire nuclear weapons capability.”

Tony Blair

Hansard http://www.parliament.the-stationery-office.co.uk/pa/cm200102/cmhansrd/vo020924/debtext/20924-01.htm#20924-01_spmin0 House of Commons, 6th series, vol. 390, col. 3.
House of Commons statement on publication of the dossier concerning Iraq and Weapons of Mass Destruction, 24 September 2002.
2000s

Intelligence

“Look, I'm a person, an individual with a character and part of my character is about what I believe in and part of my beliefs obviously is a religious conviction. I simply hesitate whenever I get drawn into this territory because I have found, over time, that it either leads to people misunderstanding the basis upon which you are taking decisions or it leads to people trying to colonise God or religion for one particular political position. I make no claims to that at all.”

Tony Blair

BBC Newsnight http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/programmes/newsnight/1988874.stm
Interview with Jeremy Paxman, 16 May 2002.
2000s

God , People , Religion , Decision

“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 co-operation, not confrontation; for fellowship, not fear. It stands for equality, not because it wants people to be the same but because only through equality in our economic circumstances can our individuality develop properly.”

Tony Blair

Hansard, House of Commons, 6th Series, vol. 45, col. 316.
Maiden speech as MP for Sedgefield, 6 July 1983.
1980s

People , Fear , Reading

“Do I know I'm right? Judgements aren't the same as facts. Instinct is not science. I'm like any other human being, as fallible and as capable of being wrong. I only know what I believe.”

Tony Blair

Full text of Blair's speech http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/3697434.stm, BBC News online
Speech to the Labour Party Conference, 28 September 2004, referring to the fact that no WMDs had been found in Iraq.
2000s

Science

“We have no plans to increase tax at all.”

Tony Blair

Philip Bassett, "Blair pledges he will not raise tax", The Times, 21 September 1995, p. 1.
Response to questioning about Labour Party tax plans at a CBI seminar in Birmingham, 20 September 1995.
1990s

“It is 50 years old, it is going in the wrong direction. It is time for real reform. The only way to get that is to leave.”

Tony Blair

Boris Johnson: EU exit 'win-win for us all' https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-eu-referendum-35783049, BBC News, 11 March 2016
2010s

Way , Time

“Ask me my three main priorities for government, and I tell you: education, education and education.”

Tony Blair

We are 35th in the world league of education standards – 35th. At every level, radical improvement and reform.
"We are back as the people's party, says Blair", The Times, 2 October 1996.
1990s

Education

“I've never claimed to have a monopoly of wisdom, but one thing I've learned in this job is you should always try to do the right thing, not the easy thing. Let the day-to-day judgments come and go: be prepared to be judged by history.”

Tony Blair

Source: 2000s https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2003/mar/01/iraq.foreignpolicy The Guardian], 28 February, 2003.
Context: Jackie Ashley in Madrid, and Ewen MacAskill, "'History will be my judge': Tony Blair, in an exclusive interview, says demos and rebels will not deflect him over Iraq".

History , Learning , Wisdom