Related question(s):
The PM is not elected directly, right? People (in GB) vote for a party, and whatever party has the most seats puts its man/woman in as PM?
Assuming the above to be true, for Blair to not be PM, either his party would have to boot him, or lose enough seats in Parliament?
No - he can be deposed as leader of the party byt the Labour party and the Queen by custom has to call a person who can command a Commons majority to be PM. This is always the leader of the largest party in normal times and so whoever the party appoints as the new leader becomes PM by default.
You’d be surprised how quickly invulnerable looking PM’s can vanish, notably Thatcher. If the Party surmises that their electoral chances would be enhanced by Blair going he’ll be made to vanish one way or another and at the moment he has lost the trust and support of a significant portion of the electorate at large and labour voters in particular so it is not at all fanciful to suggest he might not survive until the next election.
The Labour Party will win the next election no matter who leads it due to the risible nature of the main opposition. Seems a great time to dump him to me.
Furthermore, the Prime Minister has to be voted in as an MP in his/her own right by a local constituency. I don’t think it’s ever happened, but the current Prime Minister could theoretically be ousted by his/her own constituents at a general election.
The only similar case I can recall in latter years was Chris Patten (chairman of the Conservative Party) being thrown out by his constituents in Bath in the general election of '92. (A very funny sight at the time, but my opinion of Patten has changed dramatically during the intervening years, and now I regret gloating so much.)
It almost happened to Balfour in 1906 - he resigned as PM in December 1905, but remained leader of the Conservative Party. The Liberals formed a minority caretaker government for about two months before an election was called in Jan/Feb 1906, in which Balfour lost his seat. AFAIAA it’s the closet we’ve ever come to a sitting Prime Minister losing his seat.
"Furthermore, the Prime Minister has to be voted in as an MP in his/her own right by a local constituency. "
I’m off-topic, but Jjimm, is it not still theoretically possible for the PM to be a member of the House of Lords ?
Blair has one big advantage - Parliament rises for the summer recess this Thursday and, apart from ten days in September, won’t return until the middle of October. Any sense of immediate crisis is bound to have lost some of its momentum by the end of this week.
I suspect that by the autumn the public mood will be that Iraq was/is a distraction and that they will want everyone to refocus on domestic affairs.
That’s basically the point. Blair would have to have a pretty bad personal popularity rating (as distinct from the Labour party’s ratings) in order to ousted from his post while Labour is in power. If either of the two main opposition parties looked like they were becoming a serious threat (currently highly unlikely) AND Labour thought Gordon Brown could win more pivotal votes than the act of changing party leaders would lose, Blair would go. Otherwise, I anticipate the previously mentioned string of scapegoats; Straw and Campbell would likely be first in the barrel on that one (and would almost certainly facilitate each others’ departure via excessive fingerpointing).
IANA expert on Parliamentary procedure, but I’m pretty sure that the PM must have a seat in the House of Commons. There have been peers (i.e. Lords) who have been PM, but have had to renounce their House of Lords seat (and win their Hoouse of Commons seat) to do so.
This came up on another thread awhile ago didn’t it? But yes your’re right the Prime Minister must be either a member of the House of Commons or House of Lords:
http://www.parliament.uk/faq/parlgov_faq.cfm
Incidently the last Prime Minister in the House of Lords was Lord Salisbury in 1895-1900, though Lord Home served as Prime Minister as a Lord for 4 days in 1963 (having previously being leader of the House of Lords) before renouncing his title a serving the rest of his year long term as a commoner.
Greetings strangers.
I think the momentum of this whole business is increasingly not concerned with the public. I would agree that Alistair Campbell is as angry as he is partly because the continuing questions in relation to WMD undermine their most (self) admired creation, the Tony Blair man-you-can-trust brand/image. In so doing, WMD remain important as one item in a basket of reasons why some (but not enough ?) of Middle England will not vote Labour next time; IOW, undermining the ‘man-you-can-trust’ branding chips away at Blair’s erstwhile electoral impregnability, but, of itself, won’t be enough. The Parliamentary majority is just too great.
But, for the other side (not the Tories), the Brown / Short / Cook / plus a considerable portion of the 50 ex-ministers of this New Labour Administration, this is about the main prize – they want Blair’s bollocks varnished and adorning the Number 10 mantle piece of Gordon Brown.
There is no question the opposition to Blair is organised, substantial and, given something to get their teeth into, a very genuine threat.
The question, IMHO, is how they marshal their resources over the summer break because they won’t want this to go away while here is any hope at all of it damaging, at least, Campbell – in pragmatic terms, it’s single battle worth fighting (many others aren’t because Campbell is so damn good) in a war of attrition, not the whole war itself.
And other shrewd players with considerable vested interests – and great timing - like security services (on both sides of the pond), Annan / Blix (in fact, the whole UN mandate), the wider Franco / German agenda, fallout from the the US Democrats (trying to do similar to Bush), etc, etc may still have something to offer …. This business has, potentially, a very long tail.
And remember, Blair and Campbell got away (6-5) with the first Parliamentary Report on the casting vote of the Labour Chair. Blood in the nostrils and all that …
I remember the above poster from somewhere 
Good to see you back L_C
That’s very kind of you yojimbo, thanks!
I’m around for a while . . .
Say, Matron was wondering if that nasty rash cleared up ?
<It’s banter, folks. Just banter!>