British Prime Minister Tony Blair was on Monday beginning perhaps the most crucial week of his political life as he put the finishing touches to a third-term government amid talk of a possible challenge to his leadership.
Blair, whose Labour Party was returned to power in last Thursday’s general election, but with a sharply reduced parliamentary majority, was spending the day in private meetings as he finalised minor ministerial appointments.
On Wednesday, when Parliament reconvenes following the election, Blair is scheduled to make a crucial speech before party members, outlining his plans for a third term and arguing against the perception he is becoming a lame-duck leader.
One Labour MP pledged on Monday that he will challenge Blair for the party leadership if the prime minister does not stand down by the time of the Labour Party annual conference in September.
Lawmaker John Austin told the Evening Standard newspaper that he will put himself forward as a so-called ”stalking horse” — a no-hope challenger whose bid will seek to draw out more serious leadership contenders.
Labour was returned to power for a historic third consecutive term in Thursday’s general election with a parliamentary majority of 67, far below the 167-seat margin seen in the previous vote in 2001.
Although the majority is healthy by historical standard, a series of Labour lawmakers — among them a number who lost their seats — have complained that Blair’s unpopular decision to back the United States-led Iraq war of March 2003 cost them thousands of votes.
The prime minister announced last year that he plans to serve one final complete term in office before departing, most likely in favour of his popular Finance Minister, Chancellor of the Exchequer Gordon Brown.
But a number of Labour lawmakers, conscious that opinion polls have shown Brown to be a far more popular figure with the public than Blair, have demanded that this process happen sooner.
Former international development minister Clare Short, who resigned from the government in protest at the Iraq war, on Monday became the latest Labour MP to call for Blair to step down in the near future.
”I think it would be best for him and for the government and for the Labour Party if he announced that he was going pretty soon and we agreed a process for selecting a new leader around the time of [the Labour Party] conference,” Short told BBC radio.
But she added: ”I don’t think he’ll do it.”
A posse of Blair loyalists rushed to his defence over the weekend. They were joined on Monday by Peter Hain, a political heavyweight appointed to the key Northern Ireland portfolio in a post-election reshuffle.
The critics should stop ”squabbling about a future leadership succession when actually we have just won an historic third term”, Hain told BBC radio. ”Let’s leave it at that; let’s get on with the job.”
In a further consolation to Blair, whatever the travails facing his own party, the main opposition Conservatives are currently in far more disarray following their third consecutive election loss.
Party leader Michael Howard announced his resignation immediately after the poll, and on Monday, two more senior Conservatives said they are also stepping down from top party posts.
Nicholas Soames and Tim Yeo said they will be leaving their respective defence and environment portfolios, allowing them to speak more freely about the problems facing the party.
Newspapers on Monday were split as to the extent of the crisis facing Blair, noting that he is a famously tough — and lucky — politician who has escaped unscathed from earlier crises.
”It is too early to judge whether Mr Blair’s authority is in terminal decline,” the left-leaning Independent said in an editorial title.
In contrast, the right-wing Daily Telegraph said the rot has set in.
”Suddenly, Tony Blair has the reek of political death upon him,” it said. ”Leaders cannot survive such talk indefinitely: predictions of their demise have a way of becoming self-fulfilling.” — Sapa-AFP