The author of “Courage : Eight Portraits“ is, as predicted, nowhere to be seen today – unlike the last 30 days of campaigning when he was never out of a photo-op, usually well away from hostile voters and in the middle of children. Since the voters have opted for the SNP over Gordon’s Scottish Labour, he can hardly claim that the negative election result was down to Blair. He was all over Scotland for the duration of the campaign.

So why is he in hiding now? There is talk that he is depressed, that internally he realises he has the loser gene. That is the way it looks today.