Blair Defiant, Refuses to Budge on Iraq

Author: 
Peter Kononczuk, Agence France Presse
Publication Date: 
Mon, 2003-09-29 03:00

BOURNEMOUTH, England, 29 September 2003 — British Prime Minister Tony Blair came out fighting yesterday ahead of a crucial conference of his ruling Labour party, refusing to back down over Iraq and domestic reform despite Labour’s worst opinion poll ratings for 16 years.

“I don’t apologize for Iraq,” a defiant Blair insisted just before the Labour conference opened in the English seaside resort of Bournemouth. “I am proud of what we have done,” he said.

Blair is set for a roasting from angry Labour activists at this week’s gathering over both the Iraq war and controversial domestic policies such as the planned imposition of hefty tuition fees for university students.

He also faces increasingly disastrous approval ratings, with one poll released yesterday saying that almost half of all voters want Blair to quit over his handling of the Iraq conflict.

According to two surveys, public support for Labour has plummeted to the lowest level since 1987, putting it virtually neck-and-neck with the opposition Conservative and Liberal Democrat parties at around 30 percent. But the prime minister insisted that he would not budge. “This is a fight at the moment. It’s difficult. And maybe it’s a good thing we’re in a fight,” he told BBC.

Blair’s worst crisis of his six-year premiership has been caused principally by accusations his government misled the country over the risks posed by Saddam Hussein’s weapons of mass destruction.

Nonetheless, Blair insisted he had done the right thing over Iraq, where he was US President George W. Bush’s closest ally, and said he would battle on regardless of the opinion polls.

“There are difficult situations you get into as a prime minister, but you’ve got to do what you think is right in the end,” he said.

“Sometimes what you’ve got to do is simply to stand up for what you believe in and say to the country: ‘This is what I believe, and that’s what I’m going to try and do.’”

Blair also stressed that he was not about to give way to Labour party disquiet over university fees and contentious changes to the way public hospitals are funded.

“No, there will be no withdrawal,” he said. “This is a test of our, and my, mettle and character.”

Blair even hinted at serving another full term as prime minister. “If you stand for election you stand for a full term. That’s clear, of course it is,” he said.

Despite being the longest-serving Labour prime minister in history, transforming the party from a divided rump in opposition for 18 straight years to take power in 1997, the defiantly moderate Blair remains widely mistrusted by many rank-and-file party members.

Opening the conference later, Labour chairman Ian McCartney urged members to bury their differences. “Don’t forget the lesson of 100 years of painful Labour history. When the left divides it is always the right that fills the vacuum,” he warned.

But one of Blair’s former colleagues warned yesterday that the prime minister was in real trouble. “He has never really been loved by the party and I think that is a problem now,” former health secretary Frank Dobson told GMTV television.

“If your asset is that people in the party can realistically see that he does appeal over our heads to the public, if he ceases to appeal to the public, then most of his attractions are rather diminished.”

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