I don't believe these Chinese whispers about Tony Blair.—
Guido Fawkes (@GuidoFawkes) June 14, 2013

The Hollywood Reporter were given a very carefully worded response when they called up Blair’s office this morning:

“If you are asking if they are having an affair, the answer is no.”

People have, surely somewhat unfairly, remarked on the use of the present tense…

A Blairite Welsh Labour source told Wales Online:

“These comments are beyond tasteless. Darren Williams appears to be advocating the death of Tony Blair.  Mr Williams holds a position of considerable responsibility within the Labour Party as a member of the National Policy Forum… Clearly, people will ask how someone who holds such extreme and offensive views can adequately represent the views of mainstream members in developing party policy. Frankly, if he doesn’t issue a full and unreserved apology and withdraw his remarks his continued membership of the Labour Party should be called into question.”

Meanwhile elsewhere Clive Lewis, the Labour PPC for Norwich South was extending his charm to Wes Streeting, the well known Blairite careerist active in the Progress faction:

@labourlewis Didn't agree with a raft of Blair policies or aspects of his article, but surprised to read such a puerile tweet from a PPC.—
Wes Streeting (@wesstreeting) April 12, 2013

@wesstreeting if you don't like dont follow you jumped up turd.—
Clive Lewis (@labourlewis) April 12, 2013

Labour’s left are a pretty nasty bunch…

A masterclass in carefully worded digs from Labour leaders old and new this morning. Blair hits the nail on the head about Ed being on the wrong side of every argument:

“Parts of the political landscape that had been cast in shadow for some years, at least under New Labour and the first years of coalition government, are illuminated in sharp relief. The Conservative Party is back clothing itself in the mantle of fiscal responsibility, buttressed by moves against ‘benefit scroungers’, immigrants squeezing out British workers and – of course – Labour profligacy. The Labour Party is back as the party opposing ‘Tory cuts’, highlighting the cruel consequences of the Conservative policies on welfare and representing the disadvantaged and vulnerable.”

Team Miliband’s rebuttal is hardly subtle:

“As he was the first to recognise, politics always has to move on to cope with new challenges and different circumstances. For example, on immigration, Labour is learning lessons about the mistakes in office and crafting an immigration policy that will make Britain’s diversity work for all not just a few. It is by challenging old ways of doing things, showing we have understood what we did right and wrong during our time in office that One Nation Labour will win back people’s trust.”

In other words, not listening…

An interesting poll for number crunchers in today’s Sun, not least because Margaret Thatcher is named as Britain’s most popular post-war PM. Dave scored a grand total of zero percent, suffering the indignity of coming behind Alec Douglas-Home. Tony Blair won three elections for the Labour Party but only 21% of Labour supporters felt he was the best post-war PM. Also notable that only 18 percent of Tories went for Churchill compared to 25%, 28% and 36% of Labour, LibDem and UKIP supporters respectively. The winner is clear…

Those results in full.

Thatcher once quipped that her greatest legacy was Tony Blair, and her prodigy did not let her down. It appears he was on first name terms by the end:

“Very few leaders get to change not only the political landscape of their country but of the world. Margaret was such a leader. Her global impact was vast. And some of the changes she made in Britain were, in certain respects at least, retained by the 1997 Labour Government, and came to be implemented by governments around the world. As a person she was kind and generous spirited and was always immensely supportive to me as Prime Minister although we came from opposite sides of politics. Even if you disagreed with her as I did on certain issues and occasionally strongly, you could not disrespect her character or her contribution to Britain’s national life. She will be sadly missed.”

Cameron hit the right notes yesterday and deliberately put down the markers to try and compare what he is doing with the Eighties, but you could argue Tone laid on more charm. Is he the true heir to Thatcher?

She does a lot of work for charity and as we all know, charity begins at home. Who can forget the generous charity tour she undertook down under? She was paid £102,000 for her five-city tour of Australia and New Zealand, with one  cancer research charity receiving as much as £6,690, or 8%, of the total funds raised at an £82-a-head dinner which raised £81,270.

Guido doesn’t begrudge her the gong, it will be a laugh to see the avowed republican curtsey to the Queen…

Less than a week after Guido ramped up the pressure on £20 million-a-year Tony Blair over his unpaid interns, the former PM has conceded defeat and agreed to give them the minimum wage.

“Over the past 5 years the Office of Tony Blair has had a small number of voluntary interns gaining work experience in the organisation. The vast majority came to us at their request, unadvertised, for voluntary work. Of those, a number have since become full-time paid employees with us. We have also always acted on legal advice in respect of any intern. 

Nonetheless from now on, if we do have interns for an extended period, i.e. around 3 months, we will pay them the National Minimum Wage.”

Credit should also be given to Graduate Fog, who first uncovered Tony’s minimum wage hypocrisy. HMRC sniffing around might also have had something to do with it…

In a delicious twist of fate, the very man who introduced the minimum wage to Britain is facing a possible HMRC investigation into allegations he has broken minimum wage laws. Last week Guido picked up Graduate Fog‘s Tony Blair unpaid intern story, calculating that it would take the £20 million-a-year former PM just twenty minutes to earn enough to fund a three month minimum wage internship. The papers followed suit, and now it looks like Tone’s tightness could prove costly.

Evidence of the Office of Tony Blair’s alleged breach of minimum wage laws has been passed on to HMRC. Employers found to have broken the law can be forced to pay compensation of up to eighty times the minimum wage, in the case of Blair’s three month internships that makes almost a quarter of a million pounds per intern. That’s at least a couple of speeches…

Last year jet-setting former Prime Minister Tony Blair trousered an eye-watering £20 million from his foreign interests advising the likes of JP Morgan and the authoritarian Kazakhstan government. He is even sniffing round a £70 billion deal involving the Qatari royal family in the hope of taking home a slice of the pie. Surely the man who introduced the minimum wage to these shores can afford to put his millions where his mouth is and pay his interns?

The Office of Tony Blair runs an internship programme promising “valuable experience in a high profile and fast moving work environment”. The scheme runs for three months and it very much looks like a real, if temporary, job. Just how much is Tony coughing up for the lucky candidates? Merely a few quid a day for lunch and a bus ticket – the position in the multi-millionaire’s office is expenses only. Those who can’t afford to work unpaid are swiftly told where to go.

If we use the £20 million-a-year figure Guido has calculated that Blair would have to work for just twenty minutes to earn enough to pay a young staffer minimum wage for three months. That’s twenty minutes too long for our Tone…

H/T Graduate Fog.

Jayne Innes is a Labour councillor in Coventry. Having unsuccessfully stood for Parliament twice before, she’s obviously very concerned about the prospect of a stitch up in her local area for a safe seat:

Shocked to see @Lesreidpolitics piece about #EuanBlair and Geoffrey Robinson's seat. Any future MP must win through on merit, not patronage—
Jayne Innes (@JayneInnes) September 25, 2012

More details are emerging in the better sections of Coventry press about what exactly Euan is doing in that part of the world. Unsurprisingly it looks like Cherie swung the do-gooder local job for her son. Guido can still not think of any other reason why Euan would be so keen to connect with the local area unless he had his eyes on a bigger job. It would seem the Blair’s quiet dynasty plan has been well and truly blown open. Sorry about that…