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“... blairing in 1858 as ‘polishing into correctness and smoothness’ (after the philosopher Hugh Blair, 1718-1800), which seems closer to the mark. Perhaps the Penguin compilers should also have reached for their Robert and looked up the French verb blairer, as in je ne peux pas le blairer (‘he gives me the creeps’). Those easily offended should on no ...”

“... decades. What appealed to the young and to the many who had left the party in disgust during the Blair/Brown years – what appealed to the people who turned the campaign into a genuine social movement – was precisely what alienated the political and media cliques. Corbyn’s campaign generated a mass movement that renewed the base of the Labour Party ...”

“... especially the Sun, had played a central role in beating Labour in the 1992 general election. When Blair took over as leader in 1994, he had an overwhelming sense that he needed to court the press, in particular the party’s traditional enemies on the right. As he said in 2000, Under Thatcher . . . they got drunk on the power she let them wield and then ...”

“... were ex-Communists who had wound up their party and formed Demos, a research centre aligned to Tony Blair’s New Labour project. Geoff Mulgan, a former Trotskyist and director of Demos, became a contributor to the paper’s opinion pages, as did a strange young man who had changed his name from Keith Ashworth to Perri 6. Hacks have a strong craft ...”

“... rate. When the then Leader of the Opposition was questioned about his support for this Bill, Tony Blair said that it was the sort of thing Labour might themselves have to do in government. In fact, within eighteen months of becoming Prime Minister, he had gone one better, pushing through the Criminal Justice (Terrorism and Conspiracy) Act 1998 in ...”

“... his time as prime minister of Lower Saxony.* In 1999 he wrote a Third Way-style manifesto with Tony Blair. It was taken rather more seriously in Berlin than it was in London and provoked howls of indignation from SPD members. But though Schröder may have given it the green light, the decisive push for Agenda 2010, as Anke Hassel and Christof Schiller ...”

“... hopes were still pinned, was a comfort here. So was Harold Wilson’s idea (later taken up by Tony Blair) that Britain’s past imperial experience gave her unique tools and skills that could still be used to solve world problems; Britain was said to possess cultural sensitivities, for example, that the US conspicuously lacked. Attlee, too, thought ...”

“... to do was bring it up and fight for justice.’ Such promises have been made before. In 2006, Tony Blair was pictured holding a sign saying ‘Justice for Cammell Laird’. In 2008, the men had a meeting with Gordon Brown. About ten years ago there was talk of a film, but the money ran out. In 2014, the European Parliament called for the government ...”

“... mark. And so a verified George W. Bush tweeted that he ‘missed killing Iraqis’. A verified Tony Blair replied: ‘Same tbh’. An account called @teslareal – it looked just like the real Tesla account – posted that there was a problem with the car’s navigation system; @nycgov and @NYC_GOVERNMENT each tweeted that they were the only authentic ...”

“... They are the ones who are unelectable.’ A Unite representative who had left Labour during the Blair years and rejoined in the Corbyn era blasted ‘the 172’ – a number destined to go down in infamy – and sneered at the ‘Kinnock dynasty’ and ‘their ilk’ (Neil opposed the Bennites as Labour leader in the 1980s and has supported the moves ...”

“... for this sort of snake oil. In his list of thanks to the staff at United he pays tribute to ‘Tony Strudwick and his energetic bunch of sports scientists’ in the same sentence as acknowledging the tireless contribution of ‘our laundry girls’. In many ways this is an anti-Moneyball book. Lewis’s central theme was that managers needed to discount ...”

“... 29 March. One unforeseen blessing of the war in Iraq is the settlement in Northern Ireland. Blair can hardly claim the credit, as it was only when the focus moved to the Middle East that there was real progress towards agreement in Northern Ireland. The spotlight tempts politicians to perform; shift it and they can just get on with the job. 31 ...”

“... at all: they’re merely playing by the rules that govern behaviour in the Commons. It’s not Tony Blair’s wish to transfer the conventions of the House to the outside world. The rousing climax of his speech on 17 May was: ‘It’s time to reclaim the streets for the decent majority.’ You don’t have to be especially paranoid to worry about the ...”

“... The price of accepting is to swell the payroll vote, and spout stultifying drivel. In 1999, Blair calls to offer Mullin a post as a bottom-ranking minister. First he accepts. Next day he resigns. Blair gets back on the phone. He dangles the prospect of promotion to minister of state sooner rather than later. Mullin ...”

“... new homes reached a tipping point, average house prices took off like a rocket, trebling between Tony Blair’s accession and the 2008 crash. (In Tower Hamlets, prices went up three and a half times.) Even allowing for inflation over that period of time (36 per cent) it’s a terrifying increase.The chart only shows part of Right to Buy’s ...”