Brown on same wavelength as Blair

Pranay Sharma Delhi

On June 27, 2007, Tony Blair stepped down as Britain's prime minister after 10 years in office. He has been replaced by Gordon Brown, who till recently was head of the British exchequer. The British High Commissioner in India, Sir Michael Arthur, a career diplomat, would also be leaving New Delhi shortly after completing his four-year stint here. In an exclusive interview, he spoke at length  on Tony Blair's legacy, the challenges for the new British prime minister and the future of Indo-British relations.

Every prime minister expects to leave behind a legacy. And this is truer for those who have had a two-term in office. According to you, what is Tony Blair's legacy?

If you look at the domestic and international agenda, and Tony Blair has been prime minister for a decade, there has been a transformation in British society — the economy and the society. There is a view, especially among those who know London particularly well, that if you go back to the earlier time and now, it is a completely different place. The society is much more diverse, it has become very international and open. There is a big change in the way we usually run our country. There is an opening up and an internationalisation of our engagement, which is much more than before. There is a change and we now have a much more diverse society with strong economic strength. We have had the best decade of economic growth that we have had in living memory. And in doing that we have had a lot of people commuting in and out of Britain, which is transforming the nature of our place. We are becoming an international hub.

What other things could be part of the Blair legacy?

There has been very strong commitment to Europe on the part of Tony Blair. We are more central in the European debate now. Earlier, that was not the case. We had a lot of concepts about it and we were divided on the issue. As for Europe, there is a big change, also in a lot of other areas, particularly in the development areas. Also, during this decade, you can see the emergence of China and India. Blair was one of the first to recognise this happening, and thereby to turn our own relationship, UK-India relations, into what he and Dr Manmohan Singh called a 'Strategic Partnership'.

Despite all these achievements he would still be largely remembered for his Iraq policy. You think he could have acted differently?

I am not sure. I personally agree with your conclusion. I think that is what a lot of press is writing.

But Blair admitted that himself in his speech… 

I think given five to 10 years time that may not be the case. He believed very strongly that he couldn't act any differently than he did. It is very hard to sit and guess about decisions made by people who have been at the pinnacle of power. I think there have been a lot of difficulties and he would be the first one to recognise that there are continuing problems in Iraq and there is an awful lot of tragedy going on even as we speak. But there has also been progress in Iraq. If you look at it now you would find children going to school, power supply has been restored and a lot of construction and development work is happening. Britain has the responsibility for the South-East, the Basra area, which is different from Baghdad. There is much more stability there now. We have managed to train the Iraqi police and security forces and hand back security to them in three of the four provinces. And because of that we have been able to reduce the number of troops in Iraq quite significantly.

There is a feeling that Blair would be missed more in the United States than in Britain. Do you agree with that?