The 1997 Blair papers recall a time of hope and constitutional reform

The first Blair government papers were published by the National Archives last month, and they provide a window into the first few months after that heady landslide election. Thanks to one of the reforms of that New Labour government, the 30-year rule for official secrets is being gradually reduced to 20 years, and the releases have now caught up with 24 years ago.

The best bits, for historians of the Blair years such as my colleagues at King’s College London and me, are Tony Blair’s handwritten notes in the margins of documents. At one point he wrote on a record of decisions taken by a ministerial committee on devolution policy: “I do not like this at all. I must see DD [Donald Dewar, the Scottish secretary] alone.” On another, also about devolution, he wrote: “Nothing in writing until post-ref[erendums] for fear of misrep[resentation].”

One of the gems I have found is a four-page handwritten memo by Tony Blair on the powers of the Scottish parliament, which provides a direct insight into the workings of the prime-ministerial brain. It is an aggressive defence of the supremacy of the House of Commons: “It is important to state clearly the relationship between the UK and Scotland following the establishment of a Scottish parliament. What is proposed is devolution not federation. Scotland remains an integral part of the UK. The Westminster parliament remains sovereign and retains that sovereignty over all matters. It is by exercise of that sovereignty that it agrees to devolve certain legislative capacity to the Scottish parliament.”

As we can see clearly now, this attempt to resist the slippery slope towards separatism was doomed. Nor was Blair’s attempt to hold back the nationalist tide the only warning of storms to come.

An early assessment by the civil servant in charge of European policy noted “two blotches” on the good start made by the new government. Both involved Gordon Brown’s lack of collegiate spirit. “The chancellor has chosen not to minute the prime minister and foreign secretary” in the run-up to discussions of the European single currency at EU finance ministers’ meetings, it said, and “there was no forewarning (let alone collective clearance) of the chancellor’s jobs initiative in early June, even though he was treading firmly in DfEE, DTI and FCO territory”.

Mostly, however, the papers capture a moment when a new government, with a huge mandate, was bristling with confidence as it worked to reshape the constitution. How long ago 1997 seems.

Yours,

John Rentoul

Chief political commentator