by Chris Mullin
Second: Alex Salmond says that, two years ago, he and Sean Connery spent an hour and a half at the White House in the company of George W. Bush. Bush arrived an hour late, having been held up in a meeting with Congressmen over the stalemate with China after an American spy-plane was forced to make an emergency landing on Chinese territory. ‘Idiots,’ he said.
‘Idiots, Mr President?’
‘My party. They want to attack China when all we need to do is find a form of words that will make the old guys in Peking happy.’
According to Alex, Bush was endearingly frank about his alcoholic past. He had been to Scotland eight times, but claimed he only remembered about 10 per cent of the last trip because he had been on the booze. Says Alex, ‘I was impressed. We’ve all been misled about Bush. He’s calm in a crisis, self-deprecating, humorous.’ He added hastily, ‘Of course that doesn’t make him right about Iraq.’
Third: Jean Corston tells me she drew The Man’s attention yesterday to the Evening Standard report of Cherie’s recent outing with Carole Caplin, warning him that the association was damaging both to Cherie and to himself. All he said was that he hoped she hadn’t spent all that money on shoes.
The Iraq vote: a huge uprising, possibly the largest ever. Chris Smith’s ‘not proven’ amendment attracted 199 votes of which 121 were from our side. The roll call of rebels includes just about every backbencher for whom I have any respect. As for me, I trooped pathetically into the government lobby, which was peopled almost exclusively by payrollers, Tories and ultra-loyalists. With a handful of exceptions such as Ann Clwyd, almost all those capable of exercising independent thought were in the other lobby. I have made up my mind that I will stick with the government for as long as there is a chance of a second resolution, but in the absence of one I shall cross over.
As I was emerging from the Aye Lobby, after the second vote, I felt a tap on the shoulder. It was Himself. ‘Hi, Chris.’
‘Fancy seeing you here,’ said I.
‘Good to see that you are.’
‘All the best people,’ I responded, adding sotto voce, ‘and some of the worst.’
He laughed and marched off through the Members’ Lobby. There was no one in attendance. The first time in years I can recall seeing him striding the corridors sans flunkies. Outside the Tea Room he paused to exchange some banter with the ever youthful David Miliband about their respective heights, remarking that David seemed to be getting taller. ‘Are you still growing?’ Then he strode away alone up the Library Corridor in the direction of his room. He didn’t seem at all downhearted though he must know that he’s in deep trouble.
Alan Milburn was on the train home. ‘Tony knows he’s in a tight corner,’ he said. Alan thinks all will be well if we keep our nerve. The odds are, says Alan – though he concedes it is by no means certain – there will be a second resolution, that Saddam will fall, the politics will change and The Man will emerge immeasurably strengthened. In which case the moment will have come to take on Gordon. ‘Everything you hear about the relationship between The Man and Gordon is true,’ says Alan (exactly what Nick Brown, who is in the other camp, says). ‘In fact,’ beams Alan, ‘it’s worse.’ At one point, shortly after the 2001 election, Tony was becoming worn down by Gordon repeatedly demanding to know when he would be going – in fulfilment of that famous promise, real or imagined. Gordon, according to Alan, is the source of all sorts of problems – briefing against the Public Finance Initiative, top-up fees and goodness knows what else. Alan adds that Gordon was also the cause of our problems over the London Underground and air traffic control. He says all that nonsense over air traffic control saved the taxpayer a mere £8.5 million, not the £1.2 billion we were all led to believe. ‘I was Chief Secretary at the time. I went into it in detail.’
So what was it all about then? ‘Goodness knows, but Gordon never does anything for ideological reasons. Tony must have a sort-out with Gordon. Not sack him, but he must make clear who is boss. He can’t allow this situation to continue.’
As we parted Alan said, ‘We may be having a very different conversation if we meet on the train in a month’s time.’
Friday, 28 February
Sunderland
M e-mailed from Washington with details of recently released official papers detailing America’s relationship with Saddam in the mid-eighties. It appears that the Adminstration knew all about the chemical weapons but agreed to eliminate any references from public pronouncements in order to concentrate on the greater good of smashing Iran.
This morning, on the radio, it was reported that Saddam’s son-in-law, the source of most of what we know about the chemical and biological weapons, told his interrogators that stocks had been destroyed in the mid-nineties, but that this part of his testimony had been carefully excised from the published version.
Saturday, 1 March
The Man’s pronouncements grow increasingly apocalyptic. ‘History will judge me,’ he says in an interview with Jackie Ashley in today’s Guardian. The trouble is, if he goes down, he will take us all with him. What’s more, he has another life to go to and most of us don’t. Nor do most of those who depend on us.
On the other hand, if he is vindicated and there is a quick clean end to it – a prospect that looks increasingly unlikely – then the politics of Iraq may look entirely different in a month’s time. Whichever way it crumbles, The Man has taken a reckless, foolish gamble. He’s bet the whole shop, not just his future, but that of the Labour Party and everything we have achieved in government, on a single throw of the dice.
I walked the children to their art class. Backhouse Park is a carpet of purple crocuses and white snowdrops, lifting the spirits in these terrible times.
Monday, 3 March
Awoke to hear the French Foreign Minister ruling out his country’s support for a second resolution in language which seemed to me unequivocal. He didn’t actually say they would use the veto, but that was the implication.
Alan Beith, a member of the Security and Intelligence Committee, was on the train. He says the spooks were livid about that sixth-form essay on Saddam’s chemical arsenal cooked up several weeks ago by Number 10. What particularly infuriated them was the implication that they had contributed, which, of course, they hadn’t. Needless to say, they weren’t even consulted.
Later, I remarked to Hilary Armstrong that the French aren’t sounding very helpful. She replied, ‘The Boss is still hopeful.’ But she didn’t sound optimistic either.
Tuesday, 4 March
Bev Hughes came before the select committee to discuss asylum. The Tories, Ann Widdecombe especially, pressed her to say whose bright idea was the ludicrous and now abandoned target of 30,000 removals a year. No prizes for guessing, but Bev managed to stonewall. She was asked about the origin of the latest target – halving applications by September – and managed to bluster her way out of that, too. I kept my mouth firmly shut.
We have finished the Communications Bill. I had tabled an amendment limiting national newspaper owners to one Sunday and one daily per proprietor. In the event, it wasn’t reached until half an hour before the end (which allowed me eight minutes of Murdochbashing). Not that it mattered. The government had made clear from the outset that there would be no upsetting the newspaper barons so we were only playing. For the serious stuff – on ITV and Channel 5 – we shall have to rely on David Puttnam in the Lords. So humiliating.
Ray Fitzwalter has sent me a paper by an American professor, Michael Tracey, which describes our plans to permit the sale of ITV to the Americans as ‘about as wrong-headed as it is possible to be without being totally insane’. At least I managed to get that on the record, in an intervention on Patricia Hewitt.
Wednesday, 5 March
At Questions The Man was still exuding confidence that there will be a second resolution. He is in remarkably good shape despite his awesome schedule. Two hours later, when we filed into his room for the parliamentary committee, he was in his usual good humour. A littl
e tired perhaps but no sign of depression, irritability or distraction.
He has just returned from two days in Ireland where, as he puts it, the parties are reasonable in inverse proportion to their influence. He admires Adams and McGuinness (‘top-quality politicians’) but says they are ‘chisellers’ – ‘just when you think you have reached the bottom line, they start chiselling again.’ Trimble, he seems less keen on, describing how partway through the discussions he went AWOL. ‘I was on the phone to the Swedish prime minister when Trimble put his head round the door and said, “Bye.”’
On Iraq, I said that the French didn’t seem to be leaving themselves much room for manoeuvre. Was he still optimistic about a second resolution?
‘No, but we might get it.’
‘What happens if Blix says the Iraqis are co-operating?’
‘If Blix says that, I am with him. I keep asking Blix to explain why no Iraqi scientists are giving him interviews. Why not take them out of the country? Blix says, “I don’t want the fate of their families on my conscience.” Why not say that? I ask.’ He added, ‘I think there is some movement. People want to avoid conflict and I do, too, to be honest, but the French position of playing around until July simply isn’t on. The French are in a very deep hole, but it will be a big thing if they veto something that has a majority.’
I asked about the Middle East peace process, saying there seemed to be no evidence of any political will in America to move it on.
‘I believe there is.’
‘What’s the evidence?’
‘Conversations I’ve had with George Bush …’ he hesitated, ‘… promises to me, undertakings given. Not just to me, but to others as well.’
The discussion on the Middle East continued after The Man had departed. Robin Cook said that child malnutrition in the Occupied Territories was now on a par with Zimbabwe. He added that he was sceptical about the bona fides of Cheney and Rumsfeld where Israel was concerned.
Later, in an upper committee room, I came across David Puttnam, who said, ‘I’m willing to bet £5,000 that Murdoch will go for Channel Five before the end of next year.’
Friday, 7 March
Sunderland
At my party management committee this evening Dave Allen turned up with a resolution opposing the war and demanding that I support tomorrow’s demonstration. Fortunately we were rescued by the Silksworth ladies, who amended it to a demand for a second UN resolution, the position to which I desperately cling.
Sunday, 9 March
The big story is that Clare has said she will resign if there is no second resolution. What’s more, she is reported as describing The Man as ‘reckless’, which must surely be fatal?
I spoke to Mum this evening. Her little church, the Holy Hut as she calls it, is to be closed and the congregation merged with a bigger one two miles away where she knows no one. Poor Mum, she has had to give up driving, which means that she is almost housebound and the quacks (who after months of testing still can’t find out what’s wrong with her) have advised against using public transport. So she is trapped at home with Dad, who is increasingly deaf and irascible. She said sadly, ‘Everything is coming to an end.’
Monday, 10 March
Alistair Darling was on the train. In contrast to poor Steve Byers, when he held the same job, Alistair smoothly glides above the fray. A stranger to controversy. His path to the top effortless. The burden of office lightly worn. Or so it seems. For much of the journey he was reading a William Boyd novel. ‘Too early to panic,’ he said. ‘The Labour Party always likes to get its panic in early.’ Clare, he says, gave no hint of her reservations at Cabinet last Thursday. He adds, ‘To be in favour of a second resolution is one thing, but calling the Boss reckless is not very clever.’
‘The problem,’ said I, ‘is that The Man genuinely believes that his friends in Washington share our values, but they don’t. Has there ever been a discussion in Cabinet about that?’
‘Not in such terms, no. The trouble is we have just bounced along from one stage to another.’
Jack Straw looking, as ever, relaxed and self-assured (despite commuting almost weekly across the Atlantic) was in the Tea Room. ‘When this is over,’ I said, ‘what are we going to do when the Americans come to us with their next demand?’
‘They won’t,’ he asserted confidently. Unfortunately there wasn’t time to cross-examine him as to the basis for his certainty.
Later Jack gave a little briefing in an upper committee room. He made no attempt to hide his disdain for the French. Their foreign policy is founded on cynicism, he said. (‘Question: what do you call a group of Frenchmen advancing on Baghdad? Answer: arms salesmen.’) He is still predicting a vote in the House before hostilities. ‘It’s going to be bad for a while,’ he said. ‘I can’t say how long it will last, but in my view there will be a benign outcome.’
As I was going home I came across Kevan Jones, who, like me, has been telling everyone that he will only support a war if there is a second resolution and whose bluff, like mine, is about to be called. He reckons the rebellion next time will be a lot bigger – maybe 150. He said, ‘If I vote to go ahead without a resolution, my lot will never trust me again.’
Tuesday, 11 March
A call from Ed Richards at Number 10. Would I mind asking the Lib Dems to drop their amendment allowing the sale of ITN? ‘There is a danger that it could go through and we could end up with Berlusconi
buying it.’ I rang Tom McNally and asked, ‘What’s to stop Berlusconi buying ITN, if your amendment goes through?’
‘I can’t answer that,’ he replied. ‘I’ll take advice and come back to you.’
The more I learn about this Communications Bill, the less I like.
I came across David Hanson, The Man’s representative on earth, in the corridor behind the Chair. ‘For deep background,’ I said, ‘if you ever find yourself discussing a vacancy for international development, please put my name on the table.’ He promised he would, but even as he said the words I knew it was hopeless for, unbeknown to David, The Man and I are about to part company. ‘Tony is hopeful of getting nine or ten countries, plus two vetoes,’ he said, as though that was somehow sufficient, but it won’t do at all. I simply don’t buy all this nonsense about an unreasonable veto. A resolution is either vetoed or it isn’t.
I hung around until ten o’clock. The House ought to be buzzing at a time like this but, thanks to Robin’s new hours, it is deserted. I chatted to Kevan Jones again, who confirmed that he is not budging without a second resolution. Nick Brown popped in briefly to an otherwise empty Tea Room. Remembering what he told my management committee last year, I asked if he knew of any other minister considering his or her position. He said he didn’t, adding that he has considerable sympathy for Clare. I felt he wanted to say more, but just managed to stop himself. ‘What do you advise?’ he asked. ‘Sit tight and await events,’ I said.
The Man, who looks washed out, was slow-hand-clapped by an audience of women this evening during one of the televised question and answer sessions which is supposed to reassure the nation. There is a rumour that Peter Goldsmith, the Attorney General is about to resign.
Wednesday, 12 March
To a packed meeting of the parliamentary party. It had been due to be addressed by Goldsmith, but he has pulled out saying he was needed in court. Which court? At what time? – were my immediate thoughts but, upon checking, I found that his alibi stood up. It appears he is not resigning after all, but there is much speculation about the advice he has offered on the legality of war.
Instead we were addressed by Jack, who gets better every time I hear him. He was confident, witty and one had the feeling (as one always does with Jack) that he was levelling with us. He sat down to huge applause, carefully orchestrated by Keith Hill and a clutch of whips. Diane Organ received the loudest cheer for denouncing those (Alice Mahon, Tam Dalyell, John McDonnell et al) who are calling for The Man’s head. Most contributions from the floor were symp
athetic to the regime. One or two appeared to be job applications – Huw Irranca-Davies talked of ‘surprising solidarity’ in his local party. Such dissent as there was came from some Usual Suspects – Harold Best, Tam Dalyell, Diane Abbott. There was some mild sneering from junior loyalists like Phil Woolas and Lorna Fitzsimons, but nothing too unpleasant. Kevin Barron was applauded for saying that we must at all costs avoid self-indulgent personal attacks à la the 1980s. By and large it was a good-natured meeting. At times one could have been forgiven for believing that everyone present thought an invasion of Iraq was an excellent idea.
I lunched with Keith Hill, who says that the whips are advising that on a worst case scenario (a Tory abstention) the government may not have a majority. ‘If you add all the people who have been calling for a second resolution to those who voted for Chris Smith’s amendment the other day then we are in trouble.’ Of course, it is in the whips’ interests to turn this into a vote of confidence in the hope of frightening waverers. I don’t for a moment believe the Tories will abstain.
The Man was signing whisky bottles when we filed in for the parliamentary committee. ‘My daily intake,’ he joked.
‘And it shows,’ said Gordon Prentice, ever tactless.
‘Thank you, Gordon,’ The Man replied sounding ever-so-slightly hurt, but he laughed all the same. ‘I was feeling fine until I read what I looked like.’ Actually, he is not looking too bad considering the pressure. Nothing that a few good nights’ sleep won’t cure. A little tense perhaps, cheeks a millimetre or two hollower than they were last week and once or twice I thought I saw a nerve twitching in the side of his face. For much of the time he sat, hands clasped in front of him, only drawing a hand across his mouth to conceal his expression, as he often does when someone starts wittering. At the mention of the French he came alive. ‘It can’t be right for France to say it will veto under all circumstances. It is a wrecking tactic, done with absolute calculation. Until a couple of days ago I thought I had a majority …’
