Sanna Marin, the former Prime Minister of Finland who made headlines last year for knowing how to bust a move, has announced she’s quitting frontline politics to join the Tony Blair Institute for Global Change as a “Strategic Counsellor”. She joins the ranks of over 450 staff at the Institute, which will have already spent the last week popping the champagne over Labour’s reshuffle. It is an enormous operation with deep pockets.
The Institute released a statement this afternoon:
“She will be working with colleagues and teams across TBI’s portfolio of countries, advising political leaders on their reform programmes. Ms Marin has a record of accomplishment, from setting one of the world’s most ambitious climate targets – enabled by a full programme of digitalisation and deployment of technology – to shepherding her country’s accession to NATO following Russia’s aggression in Ukraine.”
Presumably Sanna will enjoy dancing to Tony’s tune just as much as Starmer…
It’s been 22 years to the day since John Prescott sucker punched an agricultural worker in the face. Moments after the Prescott Express bus had touched down in Rhyl, the then-deputy Prime Minister was struck by a stray egg as he made his way through a demonstration against low agricultural wages and Labour’s support for a fox hunting ban. Wouldn’t happen with today’s egg shortages…
Prescott spun nimbly on his heels and unleashed a sublime left jab towards 29-year-old Craig Evan’s mouth, kicking off an almighty brawl. Refusing to apologise when urged to do so by pacifist Alastair Campbell, Prescott later told Tony Blair:
“I was just carrying out your orders. You told us to connect with the electorate, so I did.”
Other famous egged politicians include David Cameron in Saltash in 2010, George Galloway after his Bradford West by-election victory in 2012, Ruth Kelly outside Salford Magistrates’ Court in 2006 and BNP leader Nick Griffin in 2009. More recently, Nigel Farage has been egged in Nottingham and was notoriously doused in banana and salted caramel milkshake in Newcastle on 20 May 2019. Ed Miliband has had his fair share of egg on his face, from eating breakfast sandwiches, fallout from the Ed Stone, and when egged in Southampton in 2012 and South London in 2013. All a poultry price to pay for publicity.
Current Heavyweight Champion of Westminster, Lee Anderson, has been engaged in a heated rivalry with protestor Steve Bray. In the latest round of the grudge match, the pair dealt verbal blows over showering and charity, while a notable spat came when Anderson stole Bray’s hat in round seven. Both are proving hard eggs to crack in what has become a grudge match for the ages.
Former Labour spin doctor Alastair Campbell popped up on the Today programme this morning to tout his new book, and in the process of plugging the dossier, the Rest is Politics host dealt a characteristic jab at the Tories:
“One of the problems we’ve got with politics is that the gene pool for politics is getting narrower and narrower and narrower. Particularly at the top levels. Particularly, having had 13 years of this Tory government. And I think we’ve got to broaden the gene pool. That means getting more young people interested in going into politics. It means getting people from different backgrounds going into politics.”
Indeed, back in the good ol’ Blair days, under Campbell’s watch, surely Labour were leading the charge on diversity? Not quite. Credit where credit is due, in 2002 Labour brought in the first black cabinet minister, Paul Boateng. Yet, for Tony and Alastair’s first five years at the helm, the cabinet was precisely 0% ethnically diverse, and the pair soon ran out of steam on the issue. Only two Black and Ethnic Minority (BAME) individuals would ever make it to Blair’s cabinet. Quite the war room on diversity.
In comparison, Sunak’s cabinet is 16% BAME, Truss’s was 30%, and Johnson’s 18%. The average age of Blair’s revolutionary 1997 cabinet was 51, whereas Johnson’s was 47.7, Truss’s 49.3, and Sunak’s has risen incrementally to 52. Of course the Labour Party has never elected a woman leader never mind Prime Minister. Thirteen years of Tory government with younger and more diverse cabinets than Blair ever had. Bad Al’s lying again…
Keir Starmer has – please try and contain your excitement – announced his eleventh campaign slogan since 2022. A spoon-fed exclusive in The Guardian this morning sets out Labour’s local elections plan, including “new regional organisers, a bigger digital operation & slogan ‘Build a Better Britain'”. A cursory look into the history of this generic, focus-group-created tag reveals that Sir Keir has given up pretending he’s not playing word-for-word from the Tony Blair playbook.
Labour’s 1997 manifesto forward promised that saw Blair write, “I am confident about our future prosperity, even optimistic, if we have the courage to change and use it to build a better Britain.”
In 1998 Jack Straw’s Home Office published a ten-year strategy to tackle drug misuse, entitled “Tackling Drugs to Build a Better Britain”
Starmer himself has been floating the slogan since September 2021, having written a Guardian op-ed promising “Labour will build a better Britain for working people”.
For those of you wanting a reminder of all Starmer’s slogans so far, Guido’s happy to oblige…
- His leadership campaign: Another Future Is Possible
- July 2020: New Management
- Labour virtual conference 2020: A New Leadership
- February 2021 economic speech: Secure, Protect, Rebuild
- February 2021: A New Chapter for Britain
- June 2021 Manifesto policy review launch: Stronger Together
- September 2021 conference: Work, Care, Equality, Security
- January 2022 relaunch with ‘patriotic contract’: Security, Prosperity, Respect (Starmer managed to forget this one mid-speech)
- Local elections 2022: On Your Side
- Labour conference 2022: Fairer, greener future
- Local elections 2023: Build a better Britain
Strong pub quiz round…
Given Sir Keir spent most of PMQs yesterday blaming the Tories for “breaking” the NHS, and praising New Labour for “getting people to see a doctor in a couple of days”, Guido’s reminded of what the public actually thought of the NHS in the Blair years. Here’s how a BBC audience reacted in 2005, when it was pointed out that Labour’s headline-making 48-hour GP targets often saw appointments denied or their acceptance pushed back, just to artificially meet those waiting time targets. T’was ever thus…
Tony Blair speaking to the News Agents Podcast:
“I always say to people at least the Labour Party had the decency to have its nervous breakdown in opposition”
