THE contrast with the high drama of Downing Street could hardly be greater. The latest guest list for Chequers has shown how, during the Iraq war and its aftermath, Tony Blair turned the country house into a relaxed retreat where he could return to his first love: rock music.
With some exceptions, the list gives little idea of the political crises that Blair was enduring in the period from April 2003 to January 2005.
Instead, names such as Bryan Adams, Mick Hucknall of Simply Red and the Star Trek actor Patrick Stewart were all wined and dined there.
Previous guests have included Sir Elton John, David Bowie, Sting, Traffic’s Jim Capaldi and Cathy McGowan, one of Blair’s icons from the 1960s, who hosted the pop show Ready Steady Go! Blair is unlikely to have been forced to talk shop, although he may have had to listen to the occasional harangue about Third World debt from other pop stars such as Bob Geldof and Bono.
Alan McGee, the former manager of Oasis, the band that became emblematic of new Labour’s early years, was invited and Hucknall, a longstanding Labour donor, liked it so much that he returned for a second visit.
An alphabetical list of guests who were entertained before April 2003 has previously been published, but until now details about the timing of official dinners — and who sat where — have been concealed. The new list updates the guest list to January of this year.
Among the new guests to be revealed are the daytime television hosts Richard Madeley and Judy Finnigan. Their supper talk with the Blairs in May 2003 seems to have been the start of a cosy relationship. Cherie Blair later agreed that her first solo television interview would be on the couple’s Channel 4 show while her husband joined the couple for a soft lifestyle interview in the run-up to this year’s general election.
On some occasions the guest lists have appeared wilfully eclectic. Bowie and his model wife Iman got to break bread with George Carey, then Archbishop of Canterbury, on their visit. They were joined at the table by Lord Callaghan, the former prime minister who has since died, Lord Sainsbury and Bill Morris, the trade union leader.
Geri Halliwell, the former Spice Girl, brightened up a table that included Estelle Morris, then education secretary, and Lord Hollick, the former media baron. Halliwell’s pet shih tzu Harry disgraced himself on the carpet in Blair’s private office at Chequers on a subsequent visit.
The guest list also gives clues about the Blairs’ best loved films and television shows. Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves appears to be a favourite. Alan Rickman, who played the Sheriff of Nottingham, was a guest, sharing a table with Sir Ben Kingsley and Richard and Judy.
At the next dinner Adams, the Canadian rock star who sang the film’s theme song (Everything I Do) I Do It for You, which spent 16 weeks at number one in 1991, was at the table alongside Jonathan Edwards, the triple jumper who won gold at the Sydney Olympics in 2000, and Lord Falconer, the constitutional affairs secretary.
Spare a thought for Kevin Spacey, the actor who won an Oscar playing a criminal in The Usual Suspects and is now artistic director of the Old Vic theatre. He turned up for dinner in May 2004 to find most of the criminal justice system sitting opposite him.
It included Sir John Stevens, then Metropolitan police commissioner, Martin Narey, head of the prison service, and Sir David Omand, head of national security.
Some of the timings may cause embarrassment to Blair. Bill Kenwright, the theatre impresario who stages Blood Brothers and is chairman of Everton football club, was entertained at Chequers less than a year before he gave a large donation to the Labour party.
Kenwright and his girlfriend, the actress Jenny Seagrove, were entertained in July 2001. They joined McGowan, Michael Ball, the singer, and Robin Cook, then leader of the House of Commons, and other guests.
In the spring of the following year Kenwright wrote a cheque for £200,000 to Labour. He subsequently gave another £55,000 to the party.
The new information reveals that Blair twice hosted dinners for Prince Girolamo Strozzi, an Italian nobleman, each time within a few months of enjoying a free holiday with his family at the prince’s villa in Tuscany.
Likewise Alain-Dominique Perrin, a French millionaire with close links to the tobacco industry, was twice invited to dinner, both before and after the Blair family had spent a holiday at his 15th-century chateau in the Lot region of southwest France.
Sir Anthony Bamford, the owner of JCB, who allowed his house to be used by the Blairs as a place to change clothes before they went on boat trips while on holiday in Barbados last summer, was invited to Chequers with his wife four months later.
The list of recent guests includes John Motson, the BBC commentator, Ken Hom, the chef, and Richard Wilson, who played grumpy Victor Meldrew in One Foot in the Grave.
Another guest last July was Professor Christopher Greenwood, professor of international law at the London School of Economics, who gave Blair’s government legal advice that an invasion of Iraq would not breach international law.
Norman Lamb, Liberal Democrat MP for Norfolk North who has fought for two years for the release of the detailed Chequers information, said: “We need to establish a public register of who and when the prime minister meets people so that there is complete transparency. The public have a right to know this information.”
