Why was Tony Blair so successful?

[ComingUpTrumps]

Random AIBU - I know. And one that might not be to everyone's taste. Sorry about this.

My AIBU is that I'm really curious to find out what it was that made Tony Blair such a successful Prime Minister (by 'successful', I mean the fact that he won three consecutive elections). I'd like to find out what you all think.

When he first became PM, I was five, so had no idea about what politics or government was or anything like that. I started getting interested around 2003, when the Iraq War started - I still remember watching the news when they showed Saddam Hussein's statue being toppled.

I fully understand that TB is a controversial figure, and I'm still making my mind about him, to be honest. I borrowed his autobiography from the library a couple of week ago. The one thing I can say is that I think he's a very good writer, but apart from that, I'm still trying to find out about him.

In a sense, I feel that TB's a bit like Donald Trump, in that he tends to divide opinion and is quite controversial as people seem to love him or hate him.

Also, a bit like with Trump (although I think that TB is smarter than Trump), I still can't quite work out what TB's agenda was and is (Power-hungry? Genuinely believed/believes that he could make a difference to Britain and the world? Wanted to see how far he could get in politics after becoming an MP? A mixture of all three?)

He understood the 24 hour news cycle.
He is a very good speaker.
He had some very clear aims which were very popular.
He was very different to John Major.
His govt got peace in northern ireland.
Minimum wage. We didnt have one before him. Nor did part time workers have rights (sick pay, paid holiday).

Oh and D:Ream's things can only get better helped!

oohmavis I didn't realise the entire electorate lived in Sedgefield!

I didn't ever vote for Labour whilst he was leader. The only person who could possibly have persuaded me to was John Smith, but he died, so at 51, I have and will never vote Labour.

"nobody gets elected on a ticket of slow, tested, sensible and affordable changes."

But that's my point- in 1997, the Tories had had 18 years to bring about these slow, tested, sensible and affordable changes. But they didn't do that. They desperately underfunded the state education system, so that buildings were falling down, books were decades out of date, children had to work around buckets whenever it rained and all the things I mentioned in my previous post.

If they had of funded things properly, with slow, sensible and affordable changes brought in over the 18 years in which they had been in power, then there would have been the need or desire for change / Labour in 97.

I am a former Labour member and activist. I worked hard for our 1997 victory in an important East Midlands marginal seat. I met most of the senior New Labour people, including Blair.

By 1997 the Tories had been in power for 18 years. The country was sick of them and wanted a change. The economy was doing well, but public services were a mess ; underfunded, run down and inadequate. John Major had been PM for seven years and was seen as grey, dull and uncharismatic. The Tories seemed hopelessly out of touch with modern Britain.

Culturally, there was a real feel-good factor about the country. Euro 96 was a huge success and Britpop was universally popular. The only time since that this has been matched was during the London Olympics.

The time was right for a new government that was far more in touch with the country and offered hope, optimism and a bright future.

Enter Tony Blair, political superstar.

He had the lot. He was young, handsome, likeable, funny and hugely charismatic. People just liked the guy, and they trusted him. He looked and sounded the part of Prime Minister. He was pro-European, pro-business and socially liberal. He actually appeared to be living in the same country and decade as the rest of us, which was a huge breath of fresh air after 18 years of the Tories.

Labour had popular policies like introducing the minimum wage, increased funding for education and the NHS, civil partnerships, Sure Start, increased maternity leave etc etc.

The country enthusiastically voted got this and Labour won a landslide in 97. The Tories were a total shambles, still seemed hopelessly out of touch and had William Hague as leader, so Labour won another landslide in 2001.

Then Iraq...

Well to be fair @eirrar we was paying of the IMF loan and had black Wednesday to cope with.

Brown and Blair inherited a largely stable economy, and if we are to be honest with the gushing about all the investment that was done under labour, it was done using PFI which we are all lumped with for private gains.

But to go back to the OP, the Tories where a mess after having so long in power, in fighting because of not joining the monetary union, sleaze scandals the lot.

Blair was a career politician who knew what to say with a very slick PR machine behind him and everyone was just crying out for a change.

He did a lot of good, and some bad, the same as any Government, but at the time it did lift the country as a whole that Labour won.

Because we were in the boom of the boom bust cycle!

Oh yes, and 18 years of tory rule had crippled the country

I think that a lot of it had a lot to do with just how fed up the electorate were with the Tories. The UK was tired of major, who wasn't Thatcher (and I do think people gave forgotten or can't really appreciate how divisive she was, far more than Iraq IMO for those of us around at the time). The Tories were divided on Europe, and immigration, and people weren't interested in that as much as they were in the economy. Blair and Brown were very together on keeping to spending limits, and that reassured those in the centre, but also people really liked Blair. He was really charming and the old and young warmed to him, he gave people hope, but yet people saw him as relatively one of us whoever us was..... He was also really good with the media, he got them on side even the Tory press and got good coverage.

Blair was the first to really get media management in the UK.

They had the original 'message matrix' that told each candidate what to talk about that day and what stats to use, so you had this UK-wide focus every single day on a specific issue that - because you were hearing it everywhere - seemed like it must be true. If anyone was off message they got a kicking back into line. They also had a bank of people analysing the news 24/7 and literally calling news outlets if anything could be called out and changed to eliminate negative coverage. It was a massive operation and hugely successful at getting a coherent, loud and compelling message out to the voters.

Having said that, the Tories were absolutely worn out and shot themselves in the foot numerous times in the run up to 97, and Blair was totally different to the old guard who'd been in place since the 70s. He came across as much more in touch with 'real' people, even though he was privately educated and got rid of Clause 4 which committed Labour to nationalisation.

The Tories continued to shoot themselves in the foot subsequently and Blair also benefited from some good economic conditions (all politicians are helped or hampered by the conditions they inherit - see Obama, who inherited the GFC, and Trump, who inherited Obama's reduce measures). He was able to invest a lot of money in really important things such as the Decent Homes programme that stated all council homes had to be fit for habitation (so many weren't) and basic things such as school buildings and hospitals, so there were plenty of examples in all corners of where money was being invested that people could see.

New Labour deployed spin, yoof and a youngish PM with some fresh ideas very very well.

Absolutely agree with this.

I think the same sorts of tactics were then used by the Tories in 2010 when David Cameron came to power (and by the Lib Dems with Nick Clegg as their leader).

I'm really starting to feel that the only way that Labour or the Lib Dems can ever win back power from the Tories (or the way that the Tories can get a majority) is by reinventing themselves entirely, hiring a spin doctor worth his or her salt and electing a young leader with repackaged fresh ideas and bucketloads of charisma and charm to schmooze the electorate.

.... À la Emmanuel Macron in France, who worked for François Hollande as economy minister, but made the decision to distance himself from Hollande and the Socialist Party to create his own 'movement' (with ideas and policies that owe a lot to Socialism and left-wing politics) to successfully become President. Hoping he doesn't turn out to be a carbon copy of TB/it doesn't all end in tears. (His publicity stunts so far have been a bit cringey.... 🙄)

I think 1997 and the need for change proves he point about the extreme political boom-bust - most people are centrists and yet now we are once again in the position of having had to choose between 2 very different options with the current Tories and Corbyn.

I've given up hoping for a new Blair for labour, frankly now I think we need PR and a centrist caucus of MPs to moderate policy.

Tony Blair was successful because he bribed the electorate with their own money. He gave them titbits like Tax Credits whilst simultaneously raiding their pensions. All the bad stuff was due to happen years down the line, after he was out of power. He mortgaged your future.
He learned from the classics: he knew the power of bread and circuses.
^this
Also- such a smooth talker. I remember listening to a speech and at various points thinking, "Surely that's not right" about specific things and even "That's a lie" once or twice , but at the end I couldn't for the life of me remember what things they were. Like being hypnotised. Always thought he was smug and fake. I have never liked magic shows: I get too frustrated trying to work out how the illusion is created to just enjoy it.

frankly now I think we need PR and a centrist caucus of MPs to moderate policy.

Definitely agree with this.

I don't think electoral bribery explains Blair although it's possibly part - Corbyn's manifesto was a massive giveaway to students etc and it wasn't enough to get a majority anything like Blair's - perhaps as it was nowhere near as coherently put together.

Blair's was much more organised, he made sure the whole party was behind it. He had management skills so was able to ensure this happened.

He was the right man at the right time.

His education x 3 policy made huge sense. To a country sick to the back teeth of inequality, it felt like a fair answer to social mobility and the money and political will was there to try it.

It didn't help social mobility as we know, but that's another story.

Also tax credits at least was help targeted at low income groups.

Blair also inherited a party that had taken huge strides to modernise.

Neil Kinnock worked tirelessly to rid the party of the extreme left who had strangled it for years.

Blair was able to use that to appeal to a wider audience.

Tax credits were a trap that kept many low-income families from improving their own circumstances.

Law of unintended consequences innit sheldon?

Sometimes what seems a good idea ends up being the last breath of wind in the perfect storm.

I wonder though how many of those that got tax credits wouldn't have wanted them until the point they ended up in the benefit trap? Not sure we've got a better solution on the table as yet.

Blair believed that tax credits would encourage people into work. And that did happen.

However, it also encouraged a lot of people to work as little as possible so that they could access/keep the TC. He didn't see that coming.

Yes a lot of people working 16 hours a week. Still, my family on low incomes were a lot better off under Blair and struggling month to month now to make the rent.

Tax credits did work to get people back into work, they encouraged SOME people to work as little as possible. The problem is that when we look at the Labour government we only take into account the number of people on tax credits at the end, which was during the largest economic crisis the world has seen since the 1920s/30s.

I agree with people on the message matrix, they were very, very good at that.

However this really has to be pulled up.

" He mortgaged your future.
He learned from the classics: he knew the power of bread and circuses."

Rubbish. Lets start with the deficit myth, the deficit was higher for most of the 1980s and 90s during the Thatcher and Major governments. They only ran one surplus. The lowest defecit for over 6 years was the one that the Tories handed over to Labour.

Labour ran 2 surplus years and kept the deficit at a lower level of GDP for most of their term until 2007, the reason why this balooned in 2008, as it did in every other country, was because of the world financial crisis.

There is no mortgaging of the future.

The reason Blair was popular even after 1997 is that people could see the differences being made. Minimum wage, lower hospital waiting times, new schools hospitals, better infrastrucutre. The country was in a bit of a mess through chronic underfunding by the tories and the electorate knew it.

Lets clear up the IMF thing too, that was repaid by the time Labour left office in 1979, in the end only half of it was drawn. So No, the Conservatives were not "paying back the IMF".