Determined to stick it out
- 2 Feb 07, 11:18 AM
After listening to the prime minister's interview on the Today programme, I think it's clear that anyone hoping that the 'cash for honours' investigation might persuade him to go early will be mightily disappointed.
He's clearly set on sticking to his timetable, and that phrase - "you'll have to put up with me a bit longer" - sticks in the mind. He spelt out his reasoning when he said, "It wouldn't be a very democratic way to decide who's prime minister".
Tony Blair is determined to sit this one out. He clearly believes that he's done nothing wrong, and is not intending to go, even if people think he ought to, merely to help Labour out.
Perhaps surprisingly, he seemed a man at ease with himself. Of course, that's also what he wants us to think - why else would he volunteer to be interviewed by John Humphreys at this time?
I suspect he thinks that the only antidote to what's going on at the minute is to be out there, to look relaxed, to be appearing to get on with his job. It's almost as if there are two worlds for the prime minister; the world of the media - where he's continually under pressure and where it's said his authority is shrinking - and what he sees as the real world (quite often outside this country) - in which he is praised.
On the day he was interviewed by the police, he travelled to Davos in Switzerland and was given a standing ovation. Yesterday, after the news emerged, there was another at a sports college he visited.
Tony Blair has, of course, lived through something very similar - the Hutton Inquiry. Then, like now, there was an almost daily revelation which was damaging for him. Then, like now, many were concluding that he - or at least his inner circle - were guilty. It's worth remembering that now, like then the official verdict may still be "innocent".
