Bill Gleeson: Blair’s golden era can’t claim credit for boom

Jun 27 2007 by Bill Gleeson, Liverpool Daily Post

TONY BLAIR came to power in 1997 on the back of a backlash against the strident right-wing voices within John Major’s cabinet.

Michael Portillo, Peter Lilley and John Redwood had between them introduced or supported policies that were making life too difficult for weaker people in our society.

Single mothers and benefit claimants were among those on the receiving end of their invective.

I was living in St Albans in Hertfordshire at the time, normally a Conservative stronghold. Indeed, it was Mr Lilley’s constituency, yet a stroll around the leafy streets gave the impression that it was de rigeur to stick a Vote Labour poster in your front window.

Ten years on, the momentum is long gone. Tony Blair’s decade will only ever be remembered for the Iraq war.

It is easy to forget that Mr Blair fought five wars during his time in office. Kosovo and Sierra Leone and a small skirmish in East Timor were unqualified successes.

The jury is still out about Afghanistan, but the horrendous bloodbath that has followed the overthrow of Saddam Hussein in Iraq is the principal event he will be remembered for.

That’s a pity. If it wasn’t for Iraq he would have been remembered very differently. He has, after all, presided over a golden era for Britain’s economy.

The economy has grown more than that of any other western industrialised nation. Tony Blair’s government hasn’t messed up the economy in the way that previous Labour governments did.

The old-fashioned socialist drive to redistribute income at all costs was curtailed and replaced by a pragmatic respect for market forces.

London’s financial services industry has particularly prospered, to the point where some observers claim it is the pre-eminent financial centre in the world.

However, Labour’s left-wing looks on aghast at the scale of the rewards earned by some City folk.

But what about Merseyside? Many argue that Merseyside is a better place today than it was in 1997. The tall residential buildings, the burgeoning number of restaurants and hotels, the busier, more bustling feel to the streets and the lower unemployment figures are seen by many as signs of progress.

The one big easily-observed difference between today and the Merseyside of ten years ago is the property market.

A decade ago, nobody would have invested in the Liverpool property market. Now institutional and private investors are falling over each other to buy commercial, retail and residential developments.

Yet the British Government can not claim any credit for this.

It has been at times a reluctant follower in what has been a European Union-led multi-billion pound investment programme.

Europe, you see, still has a regional policy, whereas successive British Governments gave up on the idea a long time ago. The British Government is meant to match Europe’s contribution to Merseyside’s Objective 1 programme penny for penny, but Britain has sometimes failed to do so.

Some might say it is better for Britain, if not Merseyside, that less money is spent on trying to regenerate the place. Public investment is after all an expensive and notoriously inefficient way to do anything.

Looking ahead, the big domestic issue is, will the economy continue to perform strongly?

It has been 15 years since we last experienced recession in the UK. How much longer can that run of luck last?

And if hard times do come, what will happen to Liverpool?