BLAIR’S BRITAIN, 1997–2007
Page 70
post-war period, with his ratings exceeding those of Mrs Thatcher for a
considerable period of tenure (Figure 20.2).
By 1999 his historically high level of approval was in decline and apart
from a boost at the time of terrorist attacks and the early days of the Iraq
War, it drifted downwards. In October 1997 just 6% thought Blair was
out of touch with ordinary people; by the time he announced his resignation 51% thought so. But in those first two years in office he was far more
popular than Mrs Thatcher was whose reputation and indeed premiership, ironically, was saved only by a war.
What went wrong? In a word Iraq, and the Hutton Enquiry after it,
together with possibly unmeetable expectations on the public services
agenda. In October 2000 46% of the populace rated Blair trustworthy. In
September 2006 the figure was 29%.
In one sense Britain’s falling out of love with Tony Blair was inevitable.
In 1997 expectations of what a Labour government would do were high –
and with the benefit of hindsight almost impossible to meet. Given the
need to gain credibility on the management of the economy and to avoid
income tax rises, Labour stuck to Conservative spending plans that
Q How satisfied or dissatisfied are you with the way…
is doing his job as…?
40
BLAIR
30
20
10
CAMERON
0
Number of months from becoming leader
–10
HOWARD
Net satisfied %
DUNCAN SMITH
–20
–30
HAGUE
–40
–50
Figure 20.1. Blair in Opposition
Base: c. 1,000 British adults interviewed 3rd week of the month
80
Blair
Thatcher
Major
70
60
50
40
% Satisfied 30
20
10
Number of years after first becoming PM
0
0
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
Figure 20.2. Satisfaction: Blair vs Thatcher / Major
Base: c. 1,000 GB adults each week
Kenneth Clarke has stated would have been unlikely to have actually been
followed. So one of the great ironies of Blair’s premiership is that despite
public hopes for higher spending on public services, overall aggregate
expenditure as a percentage of the economy did not return to the levels
of John Major’s last year in office until after Blair had been premier for
five years. In this sense his resignation speech acknowledgement that
both his and the country’s expectations had been too high seems right
(Figure 20.3).
% Total managed expenditure, per cent of GDP
44
42
40
38
PROJECTED
36
96–97
01–02
06–07
Figure 20.3. They spent the money. . . . .
In the heady dawn of 1997, few among the public expected Labour
would follow Conservative spending plans for the first few years, with real
rises in expenditure only starting well into their first term in office.
Secondly, overall judgements about public attitudes to Tony Blair have
to be made in response to a world which, in his own words, fundamentally changed in his second term. When one looks at the issues the British
public say concern them, he was right. Concern about immigration/race
relations increased twelve fold from 3% (June 1997) to 36% (April 2007)
as asylum and migrant numbers rose dramatically at the end of the twentieth century. With 9/11 and the subsequent wars in Afghanistan and
Iraq, followed by Britain’s own home-grown 7th July bombings, concern
about defence/foreign affairs increased from only 2% to 27% of the
public citing it as the key issue facing Britain over the same time period,
with huge spikes in concern at the time of key events.
This combination of security issues in the broadest sense, Blair’s relationship with the US ‘war on terror’ and his personal relationship with
George Bush will colour judgements about his performance – and until
there is a settled view about the outcome of Iraq, it is unlikely there will be
one on Blair either (Figure 20.4).
It is also worth reflecting on those concerns that effectively vanished
under Tony Blair. One of the reasons that Labour achieved a historic third
term, was because the ‘issue’ that had dominated British politics in the
previous two decades – the economy – was vanquished as a concern.
During Blair’s time as Prime Minister, concern about unemployment
dropped from 39% (June 1997) to 8% (April 2007) (Figure 20.5).
Q What do you see as the main/other important issues facing Britain today?
80
NHS
70
60
Defence
Race
relations/
50
immigration
40
30
20
Crime/ Law &
Education
10
Order
0
May
May
May
May
May
May
May
May
May
May
1997
1998
1999
2000
2001
2002
2003
2004
2005
2006
Figure 20.4. Rise of security
Base: c. 2,000, adults aged 18ϩ per month
%
100
90
80
70
Unemployment
60
50
40
30
20
10
0
0
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
0
1
2
3
4
5
6
n-9
n-9
n-9
n-9
n-9
n-9
n-9
n-9
n-9
n-9
n-0
n-0
n-0
n-0
n-0
n-0
n-0
Ja
Ja
Ja
Ja
Ja
Ja
Ja
Ja
Ja
Ja
Ja
Ja
Ja
Ja
Ja
Ja
Ja
Figure 20.5. Falling concern about un
employment
Source: Ipsos MORI political aggregates. Base: c. 2,000 adults aged 18ϩ per month
It was the relatively successful management of the economy that
allowed public service investment, and created an implicit, if not
acknowledged, feel-good factor. Blair got little credit for the ongoing
removal of the one issue that had kept the British public awake at night in
the early 1990s. At the time of his departure from office, 60% of people
thought Britain was getting worse as a place to live – the comparative
figure under Thatcher in 1988 was only 40%. Nevertheless when one
compared how the British felt about their own personal circumstances in
Q: Which three of the following eleven topics do you find the
most worrying in your country? – Unemployment and jobs
Actual
% Most cause for concern
rates
Germany
71%
8.9%
Italy
59%
7.7%
France
54%
9.1%
Spain
45%
8.7%
The US
23%
4.7%
Great Britain
11%
4.9%
G average
37%
Figure 20.6. Most worrying issues nationally – Unemployment and jobs
Ipsos MORI G6 study – 1000 interviews by telephone May 2006
2006, they were markedly more positive than their European neighbours
and other major economies (64% said they were confident about their
own prospects in 2006, compared to only 36% in France and 54% in
Germany) and personal concern about unemployment was dramatically
lower than elsewhere (Figure 20.6).
However, the Blair boom was not equally shared , with some sections
in society experiencing ‘turbo-consumerism’, and others, particularly in
the most deprived communities benefiting less – although all groups in
society saw a rise in incomes. For some, particularly those in the City
which now accounts for 8.8% of the UK’s total GDP, spending power
increased dramatically. Overall there was a widening of the gap between
‘the haves’, ‘have nots’ and the ‘have-yachts’. While overall incomes rose
under Labour, the decade saw polarisation along wealth and cultural
lines, with the wealthiest 10% claiming a larger and larger share of overall
income. And with conspicuous consumption the order of the day in
much of the popular media, Britain used consumer credit to meet its
aspirations for instant gratification. In 2006 some 107,288 people in the
UK were declared insolvent – an increase of over 40,000 from 2005.
Household debts soared, with consumer credit keeping the economy
afloat (Figure 20.7).
More generally, Blair’s meritocratic boom did not make us any
happier. The proliferation of media channels and the rise of reality programmes which gave everyone – whether they were talented or not – a
160%
as percentage of total household income
140%
120%
100%
80%
60%
40%
unsecured debt
mortgage debt
20%
all household debt
0%
1987
2005
Figure 20.7. Mortgaged to the hilt. . . . .
chance to become famous meant that for many it was no longer about
keeping up with the Joneses, but aspiring to keep up with the Beckhams,
the footballer and singer couple who epitomised ‘celebrity’ culture
during much of this period. This was not necessarily a new phenomenon,
but it was exacerbated during the Blair years. A popular culture of
upward comparison was not a prescription for feeling good about ourselves given that so many people, failing to achieve their aspirations,
might regard their life as second-best.
The Blair years saw a surge in interest in the study of well-being, with
Cabinet Office studies on what would increase national happiness, a spate
of media coverage and a diverse range of books, with titles like ‘Status
Anxiety’, ‘Happiness: lessons for a new science’, and ‘Affluenza’. The
leader of the Opposition, David Cameron, as part of his recasting of the
Conservative party, said in May 2006: ‘Well-being can’t be measured by
money or traded in markets. It’s about the beauty of our surroundings,
the quality of our culture, and above all, the strength of our relationships.
Improving our society’s sense of well-being is, I believe, the central political challenge of our lives.’ The data suggested he might have had a point
(Figure 20.8).
In his contribution to the publishing genre on happiness, Affluenza
(2007), Oliver James comments on what he cites as a causal link between
economic inequality and incidences of emotional distress and the rising
numbers of the UK population turning to medication. In 1997, around
%
70
Denmark
60
50
40
Belgium
30
20
UK
10
0
1973 1975 1977 1979 1981 1983 1985 1987 1989 1991 1993 1995 1997 1999 2001 2003 2005
Figure 20.8. Danes happier, UK less so
Source: Very satisfied with their lives – Eurobarometer 1973–2006
6.5 million prescriptions were written for selective serotonin reuptake
inhibitors; this figure had risen to 13.3 million by 2002. Furthermore,
recent figures suggest that one in six adults has a neurotic disorder such as
anxiety or depression.
None of these phenomena are exclusive to Blair’s Britain and need to
be weighed up against overall public attitudes. Firstly, supporters of Blair
and Brown’s management of the economy would, no doubt, point to economic growth as signs of success and argue that wealth-creation did not
prevent the government making significant inroads into tackling child
poverty (albeit that it still had a lot to do to meet its target of zero poverty
by 2020). Certainly, income inequality and poverty did not feature as a
key spontaneous concern for the public and Britons were relatively less
concerned about domestic poverty compared to citizens of other major
European countries. In 2007 a quarter of Britons cited poverty and social
inequality among the three most worrying issues, compared to nearly
half of Germans (Figure 20.9).
In fact, despite the pressures, and growing separation of the very rich
from the very poor, Britons seemed quite tolerant of high levels of income
inequality. They were far less likely than citizens of most other European
countries to feel strongly that the government should reduce income
inequality, despite the UK having the highest levels of inequality among
major European countries.
As he left office, 46% of the public still thought that Blair’s government
had been good for them personally and only 35% thought it had been bad
for them – a positive net score of ϩ11. Thatcher’s figure on this measure
Q: Which three of the following eleven topics do you find the most worrying in your
country? – Poverty and social inequality
Change from
% Most cause for concern
Nov 2006
Germany (1)
47%
+4%
France (2)
39%
+3%
Spain (3)
26%
+1%
Italy (=4)
24%
–2%
UK (=4)
24%
+3%
The US (5)
22%
+1%
G6 Average
28%
–1%
Figure 20.9. Most worrying issues nationally – poverty and social inequality
Source: Ipsos Global Consumers and Citizens Monitor. February 2007. Base: c. 1,000
interviews in each country
was negative: minus 2. But at the same time, while 46% of people thought
Mr Blair’s government had been good for the country as well, another 43%
thought it was bad, yielding a ‘net’ figure of ϩ3. Under Thatcher, the net
figure when she left was ϩ12.
One question is whether Blair truly achieved a fundamental shift in the
nature of politics. If Mrs Thatcher’s economic liberalism, destruction of
corporatism and introduction of free market flexibility to large areas of
the economy and British life is now generally seen as irreversible, Blair’s
investment in public services and social justice can also be seen as a new
paradigm. With the Conservative Party under David Cameron in 2006
offering to match or outspend Labour on key public services in Britain,
and the Liberal Democrats arguing for tax rises, it may be that in time, we
will come to see Blair’s years as a turning point. In early 2006 research
showed an important, albeit not decisive, shift in attitudes towards egalitarianism. When Mrs Thatcher was in office during the 1980s, the majority
of the British public preferred a society ‘which allows people to make and
keep as much money as they can’ (52%) rather than one ‘which emphasises similar incomes and rewards for everyone’ (40%). By 2006, the public
were more evenly divided (46% and 48%) between the individualistic and
collective approach.
In fact, public attitudes were ready for many of Blair’s more popular
policies before he arrived on the scene. In 1997 the British Social Attitudes
study recorded that some 75% of the public said they favoured tax rises for
public service improvements. Of course, Tony Blair pledged not to
increase income tax rates in 1997, but the electorate never really believed
him: in MORI’s 1997 final pre-election poll for The Times, 63% said they