Britain joined the United States and Spain in tabling an amendment to the draft resolution before the Security Council of the United Nations, reading: ‘Iraq will have failed to take the final opportunity afforded by resolution 1441 unless on or before 17 March 2003 the Council concludes that Iraq has demonstrated full, unconditional, immediate and
A non-stop drive for housing: when my father, then Frank Pakenham, fought as Labour candidate for Oxford in 1945, he hired a pony and cart and, stuffing his numerous children in the back, set forth along the streets with this striking placard. Unfortunately, the pony came to an abrupt halt quite soon and would not
All prime ministers need to be sustained by one necessary but reassuring myth: the illusion that they are in control. Some, exceptionally lucky, prime ministers are able to leave office with that illusion intact. But Tony Blair is close to the horrifying moment, which can be the psychological equivalent of a car crash, when that
There has always been something of a Jesus complex about Tony Blair. It suits him, temperamentally, to evangelise, to parade the passion of his belief, and to accept the devotion of his followers. It would now appear that he is approaching his political Calvary. As the hymn says, ‘Sometimes they strew his way, and his
