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Blair goes, Thatcherism lives on

Wednesday, 20th June 2007

In the last days of Blair’s premiership, Simon Jenkins is struck by the stunning resilience of Thatcherite doctrine: in time, New Labour will be seen as nothing but a change of crew

When Tony Blair entered Downing Street in 1997 he had to decide whom first to invite to his new home. Surely it would be one of his Labour predecessors, Jim Callaghan, Michael Foot or Neil Kinnock, all itching for an invitation? The answer was no. The lucky guest was Margaret Thatcher. Round she came, and in spirit she never left.

As Blair leaves office, political historians are going to get him completely wrong. They will rightly depict him as a leader who reformed the Labour party and ended the long Tory ascendancy at Westminster. But they will also depict him as reshaping the political map of Britain and refashioning the public sector on a scale not seen since Attlee. They will see him and Gordon Brown, his Chancellor and successor, as creating a ‘new Left’, defined in terms of choice, equality of opportunity and the targeted relief of poverty, thus reorganising the anti-Conservative forces in Britain and giving them a new sense of direction. This is rubbish.

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