Running sore lives on as Blair rails at Brown

Jonathan Reed, Political Editor

TONY Blair today reopens the wounds of his battles with Gordon Brown as he reveals how he found his Chancellor “maddening” to work with but feared sacking him would lead to being ousted from Downing Street.

In his long-awaited memoirs published today, he accuses his successor of slowing down public service reforms when he was Chancellor as he became the “standard bearer of dissent”, and describes how the “relentless personal pressure” from Mr Brown as he sought to become Prime Minister was “wearing”.

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Mr Brown’s supporters are likely to be infuriated by the book in which Labour’s longest serving Prime Minister launches a direct assault on his successor by saying the party could have stayed in power longer “had it not abandoned New Labour”.

He adds: “It is easy to say now, in the light of his tenure as prime minister, that I should have stopped it; at the time that would have been well nigh impossible.”

But he describes his neighbour of 10 years in Downing Street as “strong, capable and brilliant” – revealing that whenever he considered replacing him as Chancellor he concluded he was still the best man for the job.

In the book – called A Journey – Mr Blair also stands by his controversial decision to take Britain to war in Iraq, revealing how he has shed tears over the deaths of British service men and women which he says he regrets “with every fibre of my being”.

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But his lengthy justification is unlikely to convince critics of the war and he risks infuriating some as he reveals how he felt sick with “anger and anguish” when asked whether he regretted the decision at the end of his recent appearance before the Chilcot Inquiry.

Coming just weeks after former Business Secretary Peter Mandelson published his controversial memoirs, today’s book is likely to exasperate the candidates for the Labour leadership by returning the focus to the tensions between the party’s two commanding figures from the past decade just as they seek to move on from the Blair-Brown divisions. His defence of the New Labour approach will be seen as backing for David Miliband, who worked closely with Mr Blair as an adviser in Number 10, amid reports he had warned Ed Miliband would be a “disaster” if he won the contest.

Mr Blair himself is due to be out of the country today, attending the opening of Middle East peace talks at the White House in Washington in his role as the international Quartet’s envoy.

In extracts released last night, the tensions between the former Prime Minister and his Chancellor during their 10 years working together in Downing Street are made clear.

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He insists the decision not to sack Mr Brown was not down to a lack of courage – but “it was because I believed, despite it all, despite my own feelings at times, that he was the best Chancellor for the country”.

He also admits: “When it’s said that I should have sacked him, or demoted him, this takes no account of the fact that had I done so, the party and the government would have been severely and immediately destabilised, and his ascent to the office of prime minister would probably have been even faster.”

Keeping him in the Treasury meant opposition was “kept within bounds”, says Mr Blair.

“I came to the conclusion that having him inside and constrained was better than outside and let loose or, worse, becoming the figurehead of a far more damaging force well to the left.”