AH Challenge: Tony Blair as a Conservative Prime Minister

The POD is no later than 1974. Blair joined the Labour Party after he graduated from Oxford University in 1975.

This is not a diffucult challenge but I am interested in people's scenarios for Blair's rise to Prime Minister, and how it fits in with Prime Ministers in OTL, and ideas for leaders of the Labour Party.

Also assuming that Blair is no longer Prime Minister now in 2011, what would be his reputation, and what would be doing now?
 
Surely an alternative history would postulate Blair as a *LABOUR* Prime Minister....

*ducks and runs*

(Actually - serious point here - What would a true 'Labour' Blair look like - Something like Smith or Kinnock perhaps? Would he ever make PM, or even leader of the Labour party?)
 
(Actually - serious point here - What would a true 'Labour' Blair look like - Something like Smith or Kinnock perhaps?

It's impossible to imagine!

Would he ever make PM, or even leader of the Labour party?)

Blair had the charisma and neccessary ambition to become leader no matter what position he took, and he took whatever position was dominant at the time. And whoever was leading Labour in 1997 was going to become Prime Minister.

I'm not sure he could have done the same in the Conservative Party, which tends to be less forgiving of people who move from one faction to another.
 
How about Blair never befriends Peter Thomson, the religious left has little to no influence on his University days? Going with the views of his father he joins the Conservative party shortly after leaving university. He becomes noticed shortly after Thatchers 1983 landslide after an energetic campaign brings him close to winning his local seat of Sedgefield. Despite being a strong admirer of Thatchers he is seen as being charming and able to connect with working class people, a rare asset to the Conservative party and comes into parliament after pulling off a surpirse victory in the 1985 Brecon and Radnor by-election. After the 1987 election he becomes Minister for Agriculture, Fisheries and Food and after playing a significant role in Thatcher's close victory over Michael Heseltine, he becomes chief secretary to the Treasury to the Treasury.

With further poll tax riots, continued infighting and the catastrophic invasion of Iraq, he just manages to survive the 1992 Labour landslide and to his surprise becomes shadow to John Smith in Majors shadow cabinet where the two become famous for their constant clashes. Blair makes headlines with his resounding speech about Kinnock and Smiths pull out of the ERM, managing to largely pin the blame on Labour. Smiths replacement, the young Gordon Brown is a much greater challenge to Blair however and the battles over the dispatch box begin to embody style vs substance.

In the aftermath of Majors failure to make much progress in the 1997 election, Blair's alliance with Ken Clarke (the infamous Hard Rock Cafe deal) manages to carry him to leader of the Opposition where he pulls off victory after victory against the successful but tired PM Kinnock and despite a good economy and record public spending, he strolls into downing street in 2002 after pulling off a repeat of 1970.

The Blair-Brown conflict is about resume...
 
I'm not sure he could have done the same in the Conservative Party, which tends to be less forgiving of people who move from one faction to another.

There's also the problem that the Conservative party isn't exactly short on posh, public school educated lawyer types and another one won't automatically make a breakthrough. In fact this is probably part of the reason why he was a success as Labour leader - he could reach out to a constituency not normally sympathy to Labour and suspicious of its values. The equivalent figure in the Conservatives would be someone like William Hague or David Davis (or indeed, going back a generation, Margaret Thatcher) of impeccable WWC background.

Also, and despite the "Tory Blair" crowd, Blair would be too left wing to stand a chance of becoming Conservative leader unless he changed his views on a range of issues - Europe, for one. At best, he could be a younger Ken Clarke figure.
 
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