Rt Hon Tony Blair MP

Speaker 20:00

Hello, I'm Kirsty Young, and this is a podcast from the Desert Island Discs archive. For rights reasons we've had to shorten the music. The programme was originally broadcast in nineteen ninety six, and the presenter was Sue Lawley.

Presenter0:30

My castaway this week is a politician. At the moment he's leader of his party, but by next summer he might have become leader of his country. If he doesn't become Prime Minister, it will be a disaster for his supporters. But for him, the public schoolboy who might have become an actor but became a successful lawyer instead, failure in politics while not welcome would by no means be terminal.

Presenter0:54

He may be dedicated to reform, his eyes may be set unswervingly on victory but, he says, having a hinterland in which there are things that matter to you every bit as much is desperately important. He is the leader of Her Majesty's Opposition, Tony

Presenter1:10

What is it about this hinterland, mister Blair, that makes it such a safety net?

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP1:15

I don't know that it's a a safety net, but I think it's important that you're you're not a political obsessive. I mean, politics is is is my life. I'm dedicated to the the aims I've set myself in politics, but it's you know, it's not all of life and

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP1:28

My family, my friends, other interests are also important.

Presenter1:31

But you have a very young family. They're what, they're twelve, nine, eight.

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP1:35

They're twelve, ten and eight, they're shortly to become thirteen, eleven and nine, and uh it's been difficult combining.

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP1:42

Politics and the family.

Presenter1:43

And that's the point, really, isn't it? That the leadership, if you like, came a bit too early for you, because they're still at those ages where they require a lot of

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP1:43

That's the point.

Presenter1:49

Time and energy. Do you feel guilty about not being able to supply enough of that?

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP1:54

I feel worried about it. It's a decision once I decided to go for the leadership that inevitably meant there were going to be strains on the family, but then it was what I thought was right to do, and I I wanted to do it. I think if you are in politics and you decide it's the right thing to do, you've got to go for it.

Presenter2:12

The other problem you had in doing that, of course, was Gordon Brown, who was perceived to be, I think, the senior partner, wasn't he?

Presenter2:19

How difficult was it to say?

Presenter2:22

Gordon, I'm sorry, but I gotta do this.

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP2:26

It was difficult at discussing it, obviously, and I'd always assumed that he would be the leader of the Labour Party, and I I've always had a huge and still have a huge admiration for him.

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP2:36

For us that have been in the Labour Party in long years of opposition, in a way I always thought, look, fine, being leader of the opposition, but actually we want to be in government. And I always used to say to people, I'd prefer to be a junior minister in a government than leader of a perpetual opposition. So in a way our thoughts were, particularly at that point in time, how we got the whole show into government. Once it happened, once John died and we had to come to the decision, then we did discuss it. And I think it is a mark and measure of Gordon and the type of person he is that in the end we were able to agree it.

Presenter3:06

But it's also perhaps a mark and measure of you that

Presenter3:09

When you have to be ruthless you can be.

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP3:11

I don't think it was ruthless, but it was a view of both of us that in those set of circumstances I was the right person to do it. Had the circumstances been different I mean, had the question, for example, arisen after the last general election, I think the decision would have been different, but it it didn't happen like that.

Presenter3:27

All positions of power are lonely places. How lonely are you finding yours?

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP3:33

Yes, I mean it's uh

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP3:35

In the end the the buck stops with you and you you've just got to understand that. But it's a great opportunity, you know. I mean, you know, I I shouldn't uh sit here and sort of wallow in how awful it is, and let me tell you there are plenty of other people who'd like to take my place, so um I'm not complaining about.

Presenter3:50

Can be even lonelier on a desert island, I tell you. What's the first record you'll play there?

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP3:54

It's a record by a group that no one will actually have heard of. I don't think it ever sold that well and I'm not even sure they've still got a record deal together, but it it's an album that I started to listen to a lot when I first became leader and I was sort of making big speeches in the comments and occasionally put something on and the the the title of the song is Cancel Today, which is about you know wanting today to go away which is usually how I feel every Tuesday and Thursday when Prime Minister's questions comes along.

Speaker 44:19

Pull back the curtain

Speaker 44:23

Let the sunlight stream in and let it light

Speaker 44:29

A bureau

Speaker 44:32

And let's warmth upon your skin then.

Speaker 44:39

Come over here.

Speaker 44:43

Just lay for a while.

Presenter4:48

Ezio and Cancel Today from his album Black Boots on Latin Feet.

Presenter4:54

Continuing for a moment this theme, Tony Blair, that your life is not consumed by politics. Do you think that's why you've been able to achieve the modernisation of the Labour Party that you've achieved, that in a sense you've taken it on as a job that required discipline and dedication, but in the end you're doing it with your head more than your heart?

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP5:11

Well, I hope I'm doing it with my heart as well, but I think there's a sense in which I really.

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP5:16

Almost sort of stood outside the Labour Party and looked at it and said, Look, if you're an ordinary person looking at British politics, how would you want to see it develop? How should it develop? And ever since I've been in it, I've thought.

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP5:28

We had to change, but

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP5:30

I think it would be it would be wrong to see this merely as a sort of um

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP5:34

you know, as a as a rational expedition rather than an emotional one.

Presenter5:37

But it is more of a rational expedition than an emotional one, isn't it? Because you, as I say, you're not bound up with those thousands of people in the Labour Party who would, you know, live and die by Clause Four. You would you were able to say, It's not doing us any good, we've got to get rid of it.

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP5:52

Yes, but I think more than that though, you see, what what I would say to you is that the true emotional attachment to the Labour Party is not to cling on to something long past its sellby date. It is actually to say, well, what is this party about? What do we feel? Why do we join the Labour Party? Wh why did I join the Labour Party? A sense of justice.

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP6:10

That the single greatest difficulty we've had in changing has been this belief that if you change, you become unprincipled. That is absurd. Principles are for all time.

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP6:21

But policies and practical programmes will vary from generation to generation.

Presenter6:25

But in the meantime you get people like Austin Mitchell, who put it, I think, speaking for the left, who feel like squashed hedgehogs on the road to the manifesto.

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP6:33

Well, and you

Presenter6:33

And you had to squash them to make the party electable, didn't you?

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP6:36

I hope I didn't squash them, but I didn't sort of sit there and say

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP6:39

Well, you know, how do we get the Labour Party into power ditch everything it believes in? I mean, that's just rubbish. That is what has kept the Left back for so, so long that it has confused principles with their application.

Presenter6:50

But the point of mentioning all of that is that

Presenter6:53

You know, people have called you rootless in the past, but this is what's quite important, isn't it, in the shaping of Tony Blair? That you don't bring that emotional baggage of the Labour Party with you. You know, you're not a child of the Welfare State, you're not the son of a miner, you didn't struggle through the seventies. You're a man with a job to do, simply that. Get the party elected.

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP7:13

I hope that I'm also someone with a vision.

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP7:16

for both the Labour Party and the country. But

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP7:19

You're right in this sense, that I d it it's not not a question of being rootless, it's it's being part of my own generation.

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP7:26

Look, for people like me, w I was born almost ten years after the Second World War. We grew up with Eastern Europe.

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP7:33

So any idea that what the Labour Party should stand for was small state control, well, it was just an affront to your reason when you looked at Eastern Europe.

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP7:42

If the left doesn't stand for big government state control,

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP7:47

What does it stand for? And the answer is it stands for certain key values.

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP7:52

It does not stand for rigid economic policy prescriptions that may be good for one generation but aren't good for another. And therefore, it's not a question of, as it were, not carrying the emotional baggage of the Labour Party. It's that my emotions

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP8:09

are are grounded in something different?

Presenter8:12

Record number two.

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP8:13

Well, record number two is

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP8:15

is the record that was my it was my mother's favorite record.

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP8:19

And it's um Taboosi's cleared line.

Presenter9:20

Part of Debussy's Claire d'Aloon played by Pascal Roget.

Presenter9:24

Even the most cursory look through your biographical details, Tony Blair, reveals that you're a a born performer, that, you know, whether it was at school or at university, you liked being centre stage.

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP9:35

Well, I suppose that's true when you l look back on it, and I

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP9:38

I'm not always always sure it felt like that at the time.

Presenter9:41

You acted at in school at in Durham and in Edinburgh, and at Oxford a bit, didn't you?

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP9:46

Yes, I did. I enjoyed acting tremendously, particularly at school, but for some reason it never quite worked out for me at Oxford, and and I I regret that, although it allowed me to do other things.

Presenter9:56

It allowed you to lead a rock band called The Ugly Rumors. I mean could you actually sing?

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP10:00

Well, that is a very good question, and I think if I was to be completely truthful, though I shared this in common with a lot of rock singers at the time, uh not very well know.

Presenter10:09

But apparently

Presenter10:10

Liking of performing goes back earlier than that. According to your father, you danced in your nappy, aged 18 months, on the ship to Australia.

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP10:18

Yes, I was so grateful to my father for recounting that. Not something to be repeated for a politician in this day and age.

Presenter10:24

So you might have been an actor had family circumstances been different, but they weren't. Your father was a self-made man and he was active in politics. Indeed, he wanted to be Prime Minister.

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP10:35

Well, he he certainly wanted to be a Conservative MP and was well on the way to doing it. In fact, in the early sixties he was chairman of the local Conservative Association.

Presenter10:43

But you finally dragooned him into the Labour Party last year.

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP10:46

We we did. You know, he I mean, actually I didn't really dragoon him. He offered to join it, though I have to say, I think it was more a case of blood being thicker than water.

Presenter10:54

But in nineteen sixty four, just after your eleventh birthday it was, uh, he had a stroke. What are your memories of that day?

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP11:02

I remember uh being woken in the morning by my mother'cause we were about to go to

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP11:07

to school.

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP11:09

You have a sense as a child immediately that something is wrong.

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP11:13

and I remember becoming very, very upset.

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP11:16

And then she said, Well, you know, dad had um wasn't very well and

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP11:21

And uh

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP11:22

You know, we um

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP11:25

We got through the day somehow, and it became apparent by the end of the day that end of the day that he was actually going to live. So that was, you know, lots of.

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP11:32

That was a great relief.

Presenter11:34

May I ask, why did you feel it incumbent on you to tell that to the party conference this year?

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP11:40

Because I just wanted people to uh to understand that

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP11:45

You know the the

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP11:47

I mean, I did learn through that, quite early on, that not everything in life was just a sort of smooth run, and th th it obviously brought with it tremendous insecurity. And one of the odd things about being a politician, because people ask you all about your previous life, is that you start to analyse things in a way that you would never really have

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP12:05

Yeah.

Presenter12:07

That's really my point, that reading interviews you've given, you sound as if you had really quite a happy childhood, and yet, you know, on the party platform you relate this story because it seems to be derigue that pot political leaders these days have to have known suffering.

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP12:22

Well, I d I don't call it knowing suffering actually. I think they're putting it far too high. But I think obviously, I mean, if w when people ask you what are the the the events that that have made a huge impact on your life, that is that obviously w was was probably the most important event of my childhood.

Presenter12:39

Record number three.

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP12:40

The record number three is is one of the Beatles songs and Dad, after after he uh had the stroke and began to re re recover, he actually was a very, very good penis, my father, and he lost it when he when he had the stroke, he lost the the ability to play and he then learnt to play a little bit again and he used to play some of the Beatles songs.

Speaker 413:00

Never lose affection

Speaker 413:03

But people and things.

Speaker 413:07

I know I'll often stop and think about them.

Speaker 413:11

In my life, I love you more.

Speaker 413:24

I love you more

Presenter13:28

The Beatles and In My Life. So despite that change in family circumstances, you went off to um I think they call it the the Scottish Eaton, don't they fetters. And then you went on to Oxford, to St John's, to read law, and you'd just completed your finals there when your mother fell ill.

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP13:45

Oh well my mother actually had been ill before then, but she uh she actually died just shortly after I completed my finals.

Presenter13:52

You went to see her in hospital. Did you know she was dying? You went to see her.

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP13:55

Uh I did. In in fact, I think the the family rather kept from me how ill she was just as I was completing my exams. And although i it's it's one of these strange things, I mean it should have been obvious uh that that she was uh she was dying. But y you don't you know, you you're so used to your your mother and father being rocks of stability in your family, you can't really imagine that that that this can ever happen to them.

Presenter14:22

But was it partly that that changed your idea, or any idea of your being an actor, that you you wanted to choose something perhaps more secure, like the law? Although some people would say the two professions have a lot in common, of course, the law and acting, but that there was a kind of need for security in that choice.

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP14:34

Does that

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP14:38

I think when someone very close to you dies

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP14:42

You you're brought up short with the nature of life and the the fact that if you want to do certain things you better get on and do them.

Presenter14:50

So you did. You talked your way into Derry Irvine's chambers, I guess. Yes, I certainly did do that.

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP14:53

Yes, I certainly should do that, yes.

Presenter14:55

And you uh he didn't particularly want another pupil because he'd just taken on a a new young pupil called Cherie Booth. Do you recall your first meeting with her?

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP15:05

Yes, I do. Yes,'cause we were both up for some scholarship uh for Lincoln's Inn.

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP15:10

which, needless to say, she won and I didn't.

Presenter15:12

It is what comes who you say that she got the scholarship and you didn't

Presenter15:16

She is allegedly, legally speaking anyway, a lot cleverer than you, is that right?

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP15:21

Oh yeah, absolutely. I mean she she's she's a brilliant lawyer. I mean in the first bit of the pupilage I mean I I was I was struggling a bit.

Presenter15:28

She help you.

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP15:29

Yeah, she did. She helped me enormously. I mean, I was used used to remember, because in Lincoln's Inn, I mean, I was we're doing the bar exams, which I did not treat with the seriousness that well, actually I think I did treat it with the seriousness it deserved, but anyway, I didn't work particularly hard at it. But I always remember Shree being in the the Lincoln's Inn library and when everyone else would sort of go down to the pub for lunch she would be sort of eating her sandwiches in there and pouring over her books.

Presenter15:50

But instead of calling her a swat, you thought she was quite interesting.

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP15:53

I did, I thought, and still think she's one of the most unusual and interesting people I've met.

Presenter15:58

But she wasn't interested in you.

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP16:00

Uh no, not particularly, no, uh uh to be honest, but um

Presenter16:03

How long did it take?

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP16:06

Well, it took quite a long time.

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP16:09

And then uh Derry took us out for for lunch and he disappeared after a time and I I remember we were still there at dinner time, so something must have happened along the way.

Presenter16:19

Or music.

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP16:20

I like Bruce Springsteen tremendously, and this is one of the early tracks of his that that uh Cherie and I used to listen to together from time to time,'cause I I had this extremely grotty flat in uh St John's Wood, just round the corner from where she used to live, and we used to play this song.

Presenter16:28

Uh

Speaker 416:38

This year is a carnival life for real.

Speaker 416:48

Who love me tonight?

Speaker 416:50

Oh I may never see you again. Hey Sandy brother

Speaker 417:01

Not much real

Presenter17:05

Bruce Springsteen and Fourth of July Asbury Park.

Presenter17:08

You don't Tony Blake, you don't like talking about all this personal stuff, do you? You sort of lose your fluency almost.

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP17:17

I don't like it very much, no. I think it's difficult for people sometimes to understand as well that b I mean, politicians are.

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP17:24

I mean, we're we're normal people, most of us. And we came into politics because there were great

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP17:29

Policy ideas that we had, and ideals that we wanted to implement and see through.

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP17:34

And it is difficult because you then get to a stage in your political life.

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP17:38

Actually, uh

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP17:39

People are more interested in what you are privately than than your your your public position. You know, the press is I mean, it's a it's a it's a tiger.

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP17:48

And whether you like it or not in politics you'll put astride it, but it it's it's a pretty fearsome beast.

Presenter17:53

Hmm.

Presenter17:55

Let's go back to where we were in your life, because after you studied under Derry Irvine and you took your bar finals, you then decided to stand for Parliament. You eventually got yourself selected for a safe seat for Sedgefield, County Durham, went to Westminster with the class of eighty three. You'd have been thirty years old.

Presenter18:13

Let's spool on a bit then, because we've got all these lost elections then. I mean, by the time

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP18:18

A larger number of them.

Presenter18:19

Two when you went in, a third in'eighty seven, and then we come to nineteen ninety two. Now I can remember you saying during that campaign that you had spent nine years in opposition, nine very valuable years of your life.

Presenter18:34

And if you didn't win this time.

Presenter18:36

You might think of chucking it in, going back to the law, because you really couldn't afford to waste your life in this way.

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP18:43

Well, I never really thought I should chuck it in, but I I did think this, though.

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP18:47

I made myself a promise.

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP18:51

If we lose.

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP18:52

And I thought we might.

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP18:55

The next time.

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP18:56

We take all the decisions necessary to take, even if it is difficult.

Presenter18:59

So you never paused and thought, I've had enough of this, I can't face I can't make it thirteen years in opposition?

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP19:06

No, I didn't really. I mean, obviously these sort of thoughts flit across your mind, but no, I was pretty determined because I I thought I knew I mean, it may sound arrogant to say it, but I thought I knew what the Labour Party needed.

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP19:15

And and I I also believe that it's it's fundamentally wrong if the country isn't provi prev presented with a proper choice in a democracy between two political parties, both of whom are elected.

Presenter19:27

But, nevertheless, it meant that you had to spend all of those years of your life that I mentioned it is now thirteen, from the age of thirty to the age of forty three.

Presenter19:34

in opposition, which, as I think you've put it, it's a matter of waking up every day thinking of what you've got to say, not what you're going to do. That must be soul destroying for a, you know, a man in his prime.

Speaker 419:42

Yeah.

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP19:42

Exactly.

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP19:46

It is extremely frustrating, yes. Which is why it's uh it's it's right to have changed that position. But yes, I mean, you know, there's no.

Presenter19:54

You haven't changed it yet, but you're still waking up every morning thinking what to say.

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP19:56

You're still waking up in every morning. I mean, whether we win or not, I think we have now created what is plainly an electable party. We've now obviously got and I don't take anything for granted, you've got to go out and win. But

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP20:09

I think, yes, it it was extremely frustrating, is very frustrating, because if you're in politics and you've got anything about you at all, you want to do something.

Presenter20:18

Record number five.

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP20:19

Record number five was the the the the theme music for the the film Platoon. And I actually although I must have heard it at the time, I didn't really hear it properly until I was writing my conference speech this year and I was staying at a friend's house and and suddenly the the music came on and I I I think it's a wonderful and inspirational piece of music.

Presenter21:36

Part of Samuel Barber's Adagio for Strings with Ralph Kirschbaum and the Scottish Chamber Orchestra conducted by Joca Peker Saraste.

Presenter21:44

Um you said several times that your main priorities for uh in government would be education, education and education.

Presenter21:53

Again, on the personal front, do you think in hindsight it was a mistake to send your son to a grant-maintained school?

Presenter22:01

Cross the other side of London when there was one on your doorstep.

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP22:04

No, I don't, because I think it was important to do the right thing for him, and had I not done that, that would have been a betrayal of his future.

Presenter22:13

But he was, in a sense, selected, wasn't he? You had to be seen by the headmaster.

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP22:18

Well, you do in all the church schools, but that happens because since it's a church school, they wish to be clear that you know you you you share the religious convictions of the school.

Presenter22:28

It was a furoori which was compounded, undoubtedly, some time later when it turned out that Harriet Harmon on your front bench was sending her son to an undeniably selective school. I mean, this was a he had to sit a highly competitive entrance examination. You said

Presenter22:44

That the way in which you dealt with that was your biggest mistake since you've been leader. Why should you have sacked Harriet?

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP22:49

No, absolutely not. What what we probably should have done is been out there far quicker, saying what had happened and explaining the circumstances of it.

Presenter23:00

But how can you explain a way that you both sought preferential treatment for your children?

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP23:05

Well, I think everyone wants to do the best by their children. Our task is not to stop people doing the best by their children, it is to make the state education system excellent.

Presenter23:15

But we were talking earlier about this pull that you have, which is seems to become our theme here between politics and the family. I mean, is this yet another example where you were prepared to risk political flack because you wanted to put your family first?

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP23:29

Well, I couldn't have got up and looked myself in the mirror in the morning if I hadn't. I mean, if I sent my kid, I thought I mean, this is a this is a school that he would have gone to under the last Labour Government, who can go to under the next Labour Government.

Presenter23:38

Even if the party looks at you and says, well, hang on, you know, this is you're being a bit of a hypocrite here.

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP23:43

Well, I don't accept that actually, but in relation to uh th whether it's right to make this choice because there's going to be a political outcry

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP23:53

I mean, I've got an obligation to to my boy as his father.

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP23:57

And we've got an obligation to him as parents. We're not going to put it to a particular school because it happens to be convenient to do so. And I hope that, as I say, I think what is important in the end is that we actually do try and raise up the standards of all the schools, not say to parents, we've got to send your child to a particular school even if it's not a good school for them.

Presenter23:59

What's your

Presenter24:15

What about your second boy, Nicky? Will you send him there too? Will you do the same again?

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP24:19

Well, that would be a a decision we uh will take shortly, but I see no reason why not.

Presenter24:25

Record number six.

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP24:26

Record number six is Robert Johnson, who's an old bluesinger actually, in the 1930s I think it was recorded, but I I heard it first when it was recorded by Cream and a whole lot of others. When I I was uh the first b rock music I really came to was the sort of Yard Birds and Deep Purple and Black Sabbath and Cream and all the rest of it, but I came then later across this version of it, which is the original version, which I think is absolutely fantastic.

Speaker 424:51

I went through the claws road.

Speaker 424:55

Well now my knee.

Speaker 425:08

I went to the drawer.

Speaker 425:11

Better money.

Presenter25:19

Robert Johnson and Crossroad Blues. So it's Blair versus Major, probably five months from now. You're twenty points ahead in the polls, but you've got, according to other polls, a problem with women.

Presenter25:31

They think you're smarmy, too smooth, and they don't like your hair. What are you going to do about it?

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP25:37

Well, you know, people can take me and like me or not as I am. I don't think there's any point. I need to.

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP25:43

I always thought at the time with this publicity that it was the most extraordinary and gratuitous insult to women to believe that they were going to change their vote on the basis of my hairstyle. I should just say to you that when there's all this talk about the gender gap, actually there is a gender gap in Labour's favour.

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP25:58

And indeed mine in relation to younger women. It is older women. But

Presenter26:04

So is it older women that you've got a problem with?

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP26:06

I don't know that I've got a problem with. They've got a problem with you.

Presenter26:07

They've got a problem with you.

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP26:08

Well, I don't know that we've even got a problem with me, but you know, in the end, as I say, people can like me or not as as as uh

Presenter26:09

Uh

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP26:15

As they see fit.

Presenter26:15

Keepers.

Presenter26:15

It's very cheap.

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP26:16

At the moment there's no point in pretending that

Presenter26:18

And you can't flatten the hair. It's it's very easy to

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP26:21

So I've got no intention of doing anything like that, you know, so people can.

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP26:25

I mean, in the end, what I think is that people should make up their minds on slightly more serious topics, and indeed I'm sure that they will.

Presenter26:31

They'll make up their mind about whether they want you or John Major as Prime Minister, one presumes.

Presenter26:38

It's very easy to see how you differ in terms of image. It's far

Presenter26:41

more difficult to see how you differ in terms of policy. And I'm not talking about the intricacy of individual policies now. I mean, as you look at you, you're both decent Christian men who would like things to be a lot better than they are. How do you differ fundamentally? What's between you?

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP26:59

what is between us. I mean, I hope in in the political debates

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP27:03

Over the last hundred years in this country, they've been between people who are decent and want the country to be better. I mean, the question is how?

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP27:10

But you've moved.

Presenter27:10

Yes, but you've moved so far over to the right. Your progression through the Labour Party has been so far over to the right that it is difficult to see this clear blue water that everyone talks about.

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP27:20

No, I profoundly disagree with that.

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP27:23

I think what has happened is that the Labour Party rightly has come to terms with the fact that we live in a market economy and that we've got to have a successful and enterprising business sector to the economy if we're going to succeed in the market.

Presenter27:34

Domination.

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP27:39

What the country needs. But the idea that therefore there is nothing left to do, or that there aren't any differences.

Presenter27:44

But the things that you say you want to do, like improve the health service or reform the welfare system, or have a good relationship with Europe, or be the party of business and be respected by the city, are all things which John Major wants to do.

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP27:59

Well, no doubt they're all aims that people have in common, but I think the priorities and the means of achieving those aims are different.

Presenter28:06

So the best hope that you can have is that there is simply a mood for change.

Presenter28:12

of of the men, but not the measures.

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP28:14

No, I don't agree with that at all. The mood for change should be far more than that. It is a mood of change about the measures, about the direction, about the priorities. I simply make you this prediction. Should we be elected?

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP28:26

And two or three years into government, people will say, no, actually, there have been quite significant and beneficial changes from how the Conservatives governed the country.

Presenter28:37

And there's a man in Durham who is dedicated to your becoming President more dedicated than anyone else in the land, as I understand it.

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP28:43

Well there was a man in there's a man in Durham who uh who had the foresight or or not to

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP28:48

put I think it was I think he put twenty five pounds, this is going some years back, on my being Prime Minister of the year two thousand, and because the odds that he was he he was offered uh were rather long, uh he now stands to make a sort of small fortune of how I become Prime Minister. Every time I meet him in the street now,

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP29:04

He sort of looks at me imploringly and says, How's it going?

Presenter29:06

How are we doing?

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP29:07

Yeah, how are we doing? And I sort of feel that.

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP29:10

And I bear the entire responsibility for this man's future and his family upon my shoulders.

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP29:15

Record number seven.

Presenter29:16

Yeah.

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP29:17

Record number seven is is by a group those of my generation will remember from uh the seventies, which is the group Free. And the guy who's the the the lead singer here was the the person whose voice I always wanted to emulate, because it he's uh Paul Rodgers' name is great.

Speaker 429:34

Throw down your gun, you might shoot yourself, or is that what you're trying to do?

Speaker 429:42

Put up a fight you believe to be right And someday the sun will shine through

Speaker 429:50

Five's got something to hide, something you just can't tell.

Speaker 430:00

Set it.

Speaker 430:03

In the vision

Presenter30:04

Well

Presenter30:05

Free and wishing well, and that's how you'd like to sing, is it, Tony?

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP30:08

If I could have sung like that, I would probably have stuck with being a rock musician, I think.

Presenter30:14

So we prepare to cast you away on this desert island. Is there part of you that would quite like to go to a desert island right now?

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP30:20

Yeah, I think uh for a few days it would be absolutely great. I mean then I'd get a bit fed up.

Presenter30:24

How practical are you? How's the DIY?

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP30:27

Uh the DIY is not good, no, to be honest.

Presenter30:30

How's it cooking?

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP30:31

The cooking I can just about manage. I mean I cook occasionally for the kids.

Presenter30:35

So physically

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP30:36

Yeah.

Presenter30:38

Physically you'll cope. What about mentally without Cherie or indeed a spin doctor inside?

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP30:44

Well, I could probably do without that, yes, but without the spoon doctors. Yeah, but I'd I'd miss the the family and what not and I hope that my party would miss me, you know, the the Labour Party National Executive would

Presenter30:46

But without the spoon doctors.

Presenter30:51

But

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP30:55

Pass a resolution by twenty votes to five, asking me to return.

Presenter30:58

But you'd have a go at surviving. I mean, in that sense you're you're you're a do or die man, are you?

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP31:03

Yes, absolutely.

Presenter31:04

And this is you know, it's do or die right now, certainly for the Labour Party. It couldn't possibly survive a a fifth successive defeat, could it? What about you? You could couldn't you? You could survive. You could walk away. You've got this hinterland.

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP31:19

It would be very tough and l you know, we will cross that bridge when we come to it.

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP31:24

If we come to it.

Presenter31:26

Last record.

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP31:27

The song, which is Memories of the Alhambra.

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP31:30

It's a song that I

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP31:32

have not heard played by John Williams, though the the the the record is by John Williams, but it's it was played by a a friend of mine who's uh

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP31:39

flamenco guitarist, Pacopenya, and he very kindly tried to teach me how to play at home.

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP31:46

Not really. Expert enough to do it at all, but it is a it's a beautiful piece.

Presenter32:50

John Williams and Memories of the Alhambra by Francisco Tarrega. If you could only take one of those eight records, Tony Blair.

Presenter32:59

Which one would it be?

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP33:00

I take the last.

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP33:02

The the the John Williams.

Presenter33:03

Why?

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP33:04

My my luxury is would be connected with it.

Presenter33:07

Oh, I see. All right. Well, give us your book first then. You've got the Bible there. You've got Shakespeare, Complete Works. What's the book?

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP33:11

Mm-hmm.

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP33:13

The book is is Walter Scott's Ivanhoe.

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP33:16

which I think is one of the great love stories of the British literature.

Presenter33:20

And this luxury.

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP33:22

And the luxury would be a guitar that Pacapenhas actually lent me.

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP33:26

Um

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP33:27

If I took the record, you see, I could

Rt Hon Tony Blair MP33:29

I could complete learning how to play it.

Presenter33:32

Tony Blair, thank you very much indeed for letting us hear your Desert Island discs.

Speaker 233:42

You've been listening to a podcast from the Desert Island Discs archive. For more podcasts, please visit bbc.co.uk slash radio four.