TONY BLAIR has emerged as the world’s highest-paid public speaker, earning almost £400,000 for two half-hour speeches in his latest appearance on the international lecture circuit.

He received the fee during a 36-hour visit to the Philippines, where he lodged with the British ambassador.

Blair’s oratory - which cost more than £6,000 a minute - included such insights as “politics really matters, but a lot of what goes on is not great” and “religion [can be] a source of inspiration, or an excuse for evil”.

The former prime minister, who has earned more than £15m since leaving Downing Street almost two years ago, also observed: “Politicians are a very strange people” and “helping people is a noble profession - but not noble to pursue”. Some of the 2,000 tickets were priced at more than £350.

Manny Pangilinan, chairman of PLDT, a telecoms company that sponsored the speech at Ateneo de Manila University, told the local press that Blair was paid €200,000 (£182,000) for a talk entitled The Leader as Nation Builder in a Time of Globalisation.

A spokesman for Blair denied that he had requested or received payment in euros, a stronger currency than the pound. He would not clarify whether the payment was made in dollars or sterling.

Later that day Blair delivered a second lecture, The Leader as Principled Negotiator, for a similar fee at a luxury hotel.

He was flown into Manila by private jet on March 23 and conveyed by helicopter to the venue for his first speech. He found time during his brief visit to have lunch with President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo at Malacanang Palace, once the residence of Ferdinand and Imelda Marcos.

While many public speakers have had to cut their rates since the onset of the recession, Blair’s fees have remained buoyant.

Bill Clinton, the former US president, was regularly netting about $150,000 (£103,000) per speech until he cut back on his public speaking earlier this year when his wife Hillary became the US secretary of state.

His successor, George W Bush, is reported to have charged $150,000 per speech since leaving the White House. However, it is thought unlikely that Bush will be able to command such rates for long.

Al Gore, the former US vice-president who has reinvented himself as a climate change campaigner, charges about $100,000 for an hour-long speech.

Sylvia Tidy-Harris, who has organised speaking engagements for British politicians such as William Hague, the shadow foreign secretary, and John Prescott, the former deputy prime minister, said she was surprised by Blair’s pulling power.

“I can understood Bill Clinton’s appeal – every man wants to pat him on the back and every woman wants to be the next Monica Lewinsky,” she said. “But Tony Blair . . . he just doesn’t have that charisma.”

A spokesman for Blair said: “He is in great demand for his insight and analysis, which is a tribute to the high esteem in which he is held.”

Next month Blair is to address an audience of 2,000 at the Arlington theatre in Santa Barbara, California. Tickets are on sale for up to £279.

As well as a handsome income from public speaking, Blair, 55, also receives about £2m a year as an adviser to JP Morgan Chase, the investment bank, and is paid a further £500,000 a year for a similar role at Zurich Financial Services. He has signed a £4.6m deal for his memoirs.

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