Talk:A Journey

Below are some relevant passages from some of the sources.

Proepect Magazine

In both Peter Mandelson’s memoir The Third Man and Alastair Campbell’s Diaries (1994-97), their own roles in the new Labour project loom very large. Blair is important, but a rather weak figure buffeted by events and by Gordon Brown. In Blair’s own account, A Journey (in which Mandelson features hardly at all, and Gordon Brown only at the end) it is of course very different. Almost everything is driven forward by him; the new Labour project was not imminent in Britain’s political history—it had to be shaped and moulded.

London Review of Books

The answer is that digging down was Blair’s weakness, not his strength. He was always on the lookout for the key that would unlock a political problem, and make all the pieces fit together. But there was no such key to the Brown problem, and no neat solution. There were only more or less unpalatable alternatives, each of them ugly and messy, with plenty of loose ends. What was required was the ruthless political calculation at which Brown excels, and that Blair seems to find too shallow. Instead, he preferred to toy with paper solutions so wishful that even Neville Chamberlain might have blushed. We learn this not from Blair’s memoirs, but from Peter Mandelson’s, which provide a much more complete account of the Blair/Brown relationship (they are also much easier to read, since Mandelson has no problem telling his story in chronological order).[*] Mandelson reveals that Blair frequently pledged to ‘do something’ about Gordon, only to shy away when the moment came to act. Finally, in the summer of 2003, he commissioned Mandelson to draw up a plan to neutralise Brown’s malign influence by splitting the Treasury in two: on the one hand, a reduced Ministry of Finance, restricted to matters of macroeconomics with Brown still in charge; then a separate Office of Budget and Delivery, which would be placed in the Cabinet Office and subject to control from Number Ten, and would deal with all government funding and spending. They christened this plan Operation Teddy Bear. As you read about it, you immediately think: there is no way Gordon is going to agree to this. Then you think: they must know that, so the plan must include a strategy for dealing with Brown’s refusal to accept it. But Blair has no such strategy. After months of dithering, he takes the plan to Brown, who responds with a flat no. At which point Blair decides it would be too dangerous to proceed, and shelves it.

New Zealand Listener

“History as ever will be the judge,” says Blair. And yes, of course, it will. But when it comes to New Labour, the cruellest twist for the former prime minister, as indeed for Campbell and Mandelson, was played out at last month’s Labour Party conference. All three backed David Miliband, and however much Miliband tried to distance himself – I’m not New Labour, I’m Next Labour – these three books and the publicity that surrounded them showed he had New Labour dye all over his hands. David was beaten to the leadership by his younger brother, Ed (a man who lacked, as Blair himself might put it, the New Labour baggage), by a whisker – just over 1%. And at a stroke, it’s clear these great, vocal proselytisers of New Labour have unwittingly written its epitaph.

This is a draft of the proposed new section. As ever, your thoughts and comments are very welcome. Cheers

Other accounts of the Blair years

Some commentators offered comparisons between A Journey and accounts of the Blair years written by other senior members of his government, particularly on Blair's relationship with Gordon Brown David Goodhart of

Writing for the journal British Politics Mark Garnett provided a detailed analysis of the Blair and Mandelson memoirs, observing that while A Journey gives a more in-depth account of what he termed "contemporary British government", The Third Man is a more satisfying read: "The Third Man was a worthwhile effort for Peter Mandelson's reputation, while Tony Blair has journeyed in vain."

"Tony Blair dismisses any idea of his 'wanting to be a president' as 'complete tosh'. Yet throughout his recently-published memoirs, Tony Blair: A Journey (Hutchinson, 2010), he writes as if he embodied the executive power in the United Kingdom, with the right to have the last word on every major policy decision; as if he were, indeed, a British equivalent of the US president."

Archie Brown, History Today

"Blair's role in the Northern Ireland settlement was perhaps his single most noteworthy achievement. His account of it is also the best chapter in a book which, even by the standards of memoirists who fancy themselves to be remarkable leaders, is strikingly egocentric."

Archie Brown, History Today