Gordon Brown is set to become prime minister, bringing to an end Tony Blair's 10 years in power.

Mr Brown is expected to meet the Queen, who will formally offer him the role, at about 1400 BST.

Mr Blair will leave office after his final prime minister's questions session. It is thought he will also announce he is standing down as an MP.

Mr Brown is expected to begin his Cabinet reshuffle by naming the next chancellor and home secretary.

So what will become of Blair now?

So what will become of Blair now?
Tony Blair may announce he is stepping down as the Member of Parliament for Sedgefield and if he does quit he is llikely to be confirmed as a Middle East envoy by the Mid-East quartet of the US, Russia, the UN and the EU.

Tony Blair is now handing in his resignation to the Queen and so until Gordon Brown arrives to see the Queen when called for, the UK will be briefly for a moment of time without a Prime Minister.

End of an era. Blair has been the British PM for the entire time I have been conscious of international politics. So is Gordon Brown just interim PM until such a time as the Labour party elects a new leader, or is he the bona fide permanent leader of Labour?

End of an era. Blair has been the British PM for the entire time I have been conscious of international politics. So is Gordon Brown just interim PM until such a time as the Labour party elects a new leader, or is he the bona fide permanent leader of Labour?


He is the permanent leader of the Labour party and will be Prime Minister at least until the next General election.  The next election must be held by 2010 but it is up to Gordon Brown if he wants to call for an election before then.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/6245682.stm

I have to say, David Cameron greatly impressed me with his adressing of the former Prime-Minister, nice to see Partisan politics put to one side for the day to at least think back on a few of Blair's more successful moments.

Here's my final say on Blair - His first 5 years in office were exactly what the country needed, a fresh approach, little to no nonsense, charisma and gaining the adoration of the wider global community. Blair was indeed a kick in the backside and a necessary one.

The second 5 years, Blair succumbed to the Maggie Eyes disease and became far more focused on retaining power than actually improving the country.
Due to the Parliamentary system, the Iraq War, the Removal of rights etc can't be placed entirely on him as a majority of elected MP's had to vote with him, but his introduction of such bills will place a big question mark next to his name in the history books.

Tony Blair has not only resigned as Prime Minister, but also as a Member of Parliament too, leaving his constituancy to have a local by-election to find a new MP to replace in Parliament.

http://farm2.static.flickr.com/1327/640439872_5659e27f9b_m.jpg

After waving goodbye to Downing he is now just a Mr Tony Blair, with the honours of the security of police protection, private cars, etc.

The last I heard, Princess Blair was running for a job as a Middle East envoy...

So he'd be a hostage-taker's dream target, then!

But what of his poor, impoverished lawyer wife, Cherie?

Well, she could always go to Sheffield, lie down and yawn...that'd get rid of the flood water!

He is the permanent leader of the Labour party and will be Prime Minister at least until the next General election.  The next election must be held by 2010 but it is up to Gordon Brown if he wants to call for an election before then.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/6245682.stm


What would cause him to call an election before that?  Could Parliament call an election, or does it have to be Mr. Brown who makes the request(is it a request, or an order?)?

Go Gordon Go!
8)

What would cause him to call an election before that?  Could Parliament call an election, or does it have to be Mr. Brown who makes the request(is it a request, or an order?)?


So the maximum time between elections is five years.  However the prime minister could call an election if he was certain that his party would win.  For example Thatcher called an election on the back of the successful Falklands War. Actually he probably has to ask the Queen to do so, I'm a bit hazy on the exact detail.

The Prime Minister on his own (i.e. without a vote in the house) does have the power to dissolve parliament, i.e. call a general election.  One example of this was in 1974, when, after the February election, there was a minority Labour government under Harold Wilson (they had polled slightly fewer votes than the Conservatives, but had 3 more seats); after failing to reach an agreement with the Liberal party (who had polled half as many votes, but ended up with 13 seats - back in those days, I could name all the Liberal MPs... by weight, half of them were Cyril Smith, anyway), Wilson called an election in October, which gave him just about enough seats for an overall majority.

Typically, the only reason a prime minister would call an early election would be if they're pretty confident of winning, though the tradition is that it's after at least four years - the public would tire of regular elections pretty quickly, so any electoral advantage would quickly be lost.

IIRC, the opposition can force a general election by winning a vote of no confidence in the government.  Can't remember the last time that happened.


I have to say, David Cameron greatly impressed me with his adressing of the former Prime-Minister, nice to see Partisan politics put to one side for the day to at least think back on a few of Blair's more successful moments.

It's another parliamentary tradition that everyone's nice to the departing PM (and other party leaders - I seem to remember Blair's farewell to William Hague being almost vomit-inducing - MPs from both sides queue up to say nice things about someone they'd have been lampooning only a few days earlier). 


Here's my final say on Blair - His first 5 years in office were exactly what the country needed, a fresh approach, little to no nonsense, charisma and gaining the adoration of the wider global community. Blair was indeed a kick in the backside and a necessary one.

The second 5 years, Blair succumbed to the Maggie Eyes disease and became far more focused on retaining power than actually improving the country.
Due to the Parliamentary system, the Iraq War, the Removal of rights etc can't be placed entirely on him as a majority of elected MP's had to vote with him, but his introduction of such bills will place a big question mark next to his name in the history books.

I'd not quite go along with all of this: the way I see the Blair years is that by and large I agreed with the analysis of what was wrong, and with quite a bit of the rhetoric about what needed to be done; however, in practical terms the implementation of so many things was way off, laws have been drafted badly and frequently as knee-jerks with no thought to implications and possible ramifications.  Things look a lot worse over the last few years, mainly because the results of decisions made in the first few are only just starting to show.

I believe Blair (and most of the rest of them) really, really wanted to do the best thing for the country, but through a combination of poor advice and misguided direction have rarely made things better, and frequently worse.

Brown's going to have his work cut out to avoid huge screw-ups.

Anyway, to finish off with a quote from Lloyd George, which seems somehow appropriate:

"Count not his broken pledges as a crime.
He meant them, how he meant them, at the time"

IIRC, the opposition can force a general election by winning a vote of no confidence in the government.  Can't remember the last time that happened.


Happens here all the time, it seems.

Our last two federal elections were the result of non-confidence votes. The next one, whenever it is, will undoubtedly come about in the same way. This is because our present government is a minortiy, and so was the last one. The PM of a minority government will sometimes purposely stage a major vote that he knows he will lose just to force an election. That way he can blame the oposition if the people get whiney about having another election so soon after the previous one. This is probably what Prime Minister Harper will end up doing to trigger our next elections. A minority PM is always thinking about his possible future majority, so it's his mission to make the opposition look bad as much as possible before an election.

However, this same PM has talked quite a lot about fixed election dates for governments in majority status, but of course he's probably holding off on putting that bill to a vote untill after he should win a majority government in an elction he will force.

Political tricksters.

http://img14.imageshack.us/img14/5514/slicker1ec.gif

I like his fish sticks.

Who's going to take over his show on The Food Channel? ???

With the car bomb found in central London, this is a rude awakening for Gordon Brown and his Cabinet.

Who's going to take over his show on The Food Channel? ???


I hope its not the same guy.  Is the deep fried Mars bar a speciality?