Interviewers: Peter Riddell and Philip Webster of The Times
THE TIMES
We thought we would kick off on the area which people are talking about at the moment. So you have come back and your future is again the main subject. A former Labour Minister said yesterday that your extended departure was bleeding the Party. You clearly don't want to go just yet, but how can you stop the next few weeks and the Conference being ruined by speculation?
PRIME MINISTER
Well it is a tough time for the government but the most important thing at this stage of a government is to ask whether you have got the right policies and if you have to stick by them and see them through. But there are really three groups of people - it is perfectly understandable that people are debating this, and personally I think whatever I said about my future they would be debating this in one form or another because that is what happens in the third term of a government. You need to go back to the post-1987 period to see that with the Conservatives. But there are really three groups of people: there are those who are worried about the polls; there are those who are worried about me going on, and on, and on; and then there are those - probably the largest part - who actually don't simply want a change of leader but a change of direction.
Now to deal with each of these three in turn. Those who are worried about the polls. It is true the polls are difficult for us at the moment and the problem is that the Labour Party has no similar experience to draw upon because the Labour Party has never had two full consecutive terms, let alone three, so the Labour Party has never been in its tenth year of consecutive government, not ever in its hundred years of history. But the Conservative Party has been in that position reasonably frequently and if you look at the polls then they were roughly the same for that government because once you get into your tenth year in government people are fed up, you disappoint people, you have got people impatient for change and so on.
The most foolish thing you can do at that point is to have an internal debate that assesses the governing party rather than an external debate about the policies that are good for the country. So my belief is that people who are worried about the polls should realise that this is what happens in a third term of government. If your policies are correct, and you believe in them, then stand by them, fight for them, and have the confidence and self-belief that you will see it through.
In respect of the second group of people, those who say well I think he is just going to go on, and on and on, I have done what no other Prime Minister has ever done in a similar situation. I have said that I won't fight another election and I have also said, on the record, that I will give ample time for my successor. Now I think for anyone reasonable that should be enough to realise this is not the same as Mrs Thatcher in the 1990s who said she would go on, and on, and on. There will be change but the important thing that people generally want - stable and orderly change - is not to keep obsessing about it in the meantime but instead to get on with the business of government, because what will increase our problem in the polls is if people think that we are either paralysed as a government or have run out of steam because we are debating this issue continually.
Now the truth is we are not paralysed or running out of steam. The fact is this government is pursuing a programme of NHS reform which is revolutionary. Most people would accept that. We have the Trust Schools and City Academies that we need to get a critical mass of. We have Pensions and Energy policies which we have now secured policy for but then need consequent legislation for. We have got massive issues on Law and Order and Immigration which we can come back to in a moment, and then we have got major foreign policy questions that of course we are deeply involved with. So I see this as a government in policy terms that is pushing ahead on all fronts and that is what we need to get across to people as opposed to an internal debate that in the end I think people will, if they think that we are mishandling that debate, not help us at all.
And the third thing, which is a very significant number of the group, including some of the former Ministers that you referred to, actually want a change of direction. They don't believe in NHS reforms and the Trust Schools, in the Energy policy and so on and for those people I am afraid, and this is the single biggest danger that we face, is that my view is we only won as a Labour Party because we were a different type of Labour Party. We must maintain that. New Labour is simply the name we gave to what was a different idea which was a Labour Party able to appeal to business as well as Unions, a Labour Party that stood for aspiration and ambition as well as simply compassion and a Labour Party that was prepared to take hard-headed decisions and stick by them.
Now I think we have at least one major factor that supports the case that I am making which is, to go back to the point I started with, that this is the first time in one hundred years of the Labour Party's existence that we have ever been in the tenth year of government. So that is what I think and you know I think I have said enough for anyone reasonable to know that I will do my best for the country and the Party to make sure that when I do depart it is done in a stable and sensible and orderly way, but in the meantime I shall get on with the job of Prime Minister and we should get on with the job of governing the country. And if we are talking about the issues that concern people then they will respond to us far better.
THE TIMES
But is it possible to concentrate on the issues? You mentioned you have got this speech coming up at the TUC and you did a briefing note on Friday I think talking about the things that are coming up in that speech. Is it possible for you and the Party and everybody to concentrate on that unless you get this timing thing out of the way in however vague way you do it? They don't want you to give a date, they want you to give a sort of broad of that
PRIME MINISTER
I have given a broad indication, haven't I? I have said I am not fighting the next election and I will leave ample time for my successor. And I really think, you know what is absurd is that for the people who say you must stop this continual speculation about the leadership continually to speculate about it, I mean I am not the one who keeps raising this issue. What I think is important for us is to be talking for example about these issues to do with immigration and terrorism which are huge issues for the country. We have got to be out there saying in fact we have real and significant changes for the good in the Health Service and Education but there are a lot of lessons we have got to learn from what we have done and we can improve the situation still further in the areas of Public Service.
