Anthony Charles Lynton "Tony" Blair (born 6 May 1953) was Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 2 May 1997 to 27 June 2007, succeeding John Major and preceding Gordon Brown. Blair, the leader of the UK Labor Party from 1994 to 2017, moved the party closer to the political center from socialism in order to allow for the party to win an election again. Blair's "Third Way" politics won him the premiership for ten years, and his term saw the United Kingdom controversially side with US president George W. Bush during his invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq.
Biography[]
Anthony Charles Lynton Blair was born in Edinburgh, Scotland on 6 May 1953 and was educated at Fettes and at Oxford. He qualified as a lawyer before being called to the bar in 1976, and he was elected as a Labor Party MP for Sedgefield in 1983. He served as Shadow Home Secretary under John Smith from 1992, and he successfully developed Labor's image as a party which was strict on law and order, an area that had hitherto been a strong asset of the Conservative Party. His youthful image, as well as his ability to unite the reformist elements within the party, secured his succession to the party leadership in 1994 after Smith's sudden death. He accelerated his predecessor's drive for the modernization of the party, removing the party's commitment to nationalization. His frequent presence in the national media, his tireless speechmaking, and his centrism led to his critics deriding him as a soundbite politician without principle. Blair increased public spending, introduced a national minimum wage, devolved powers to new parliaments in Scotland and Wales, and ended The Troubles in Northern Ireland with the Good Friday Agreement of 1998. His public opinion fell as the result of his involvement in the Afghanistan War and the Iraq War, with many members of his own party calling for him to be tried for war crimes and waging a war of aggression. In 2007, he announced that he would not lead Labour in a fourth general election, and Labor leader Gordon Brown succeeded him. He was involved with several non-governmental organizations after his departure from politics.