‘He’s a war criminal’ ...public backlash as Tony Blair f inally lands a knighthood
THE decision to award Tony Blair a knighthood provoked an angry backlash yesterday, with critics demanding an overhaul of the honours system.
The issue of ennobling the former Labour Prime Minister has been much debated in recent years due to his role in taking the UK into Iraq and Afghanistan, which has led to the deaths of more than 600 British personnel and many more civilians.
Last night, a petition calling for the honour to be rescinded had attracted more than 53,000 signatures within the first 24 hours.
Former MP George Galloway tweeted: ‘Arise Sir Tony Blair, the mass-murdering war criminal, liar and mountebank. It literally takes the biscuit.’
Australian journalist John Pilger said: ‘The contempt in which Britain’s elite holds the public has never been more eloquently expressed than in the decision to award Tony Blair the highest order of knighthood. One million Iraqis dead, three million dispossessed, a trail of blood to 7/7. Rise Sir Tony!’
Sir Tony faced years of criticism over his decision to go to war in Iraq, culminating in the devastating inquiry by Sir John Chilcot. His 2016 report found the former Prime Minister presented the case for war with ‘a certainty which was not justified’ based on ‘flawed’ intelligence about Iraq’s supposed weapons of mass destruction.
Following Sir John’s damning verdict, Sir Tony insisted he would ‘take the same decision’ to invade again if he was presented with the same intelligence.
Sir Tony’s appointment to the Order of the Garter has led to speculation that similar honours may be planned for his successors at No 10 – Gordon Brown, David Cameron, and Theresa May.
The delay in honouring Sir Tony is thought to have acted as a ‘gongblocker’, preventing subsequent Prime Ministers from being awarded honours due to a longstanding convention that no premier can be honoured before any of their predecessors.
All but one of the Queen’s nine Prime Ministers before Sir Tony were appointed a Knight of the Garter, an honour created by Edward III in 1348, a few years after leaving office. The only exception – Alec Douglas-Home – was given the Order of the Thistle. But Sir Tony was forced to wait for more than 14 years.
It had been suggested that the Queen’s strained relationship with him during his ten years in Downing Street may have contributed to the ‘snub’.
Only one former Prime Minister has had to wait as long as Sir Tony
for the honour – Edward Heath, who was appointed to the Order of Garter in 1992, 18 years after leaving office in 1974.
Winston Churchill and Harold Wilson took knighthoods immediately after departing Downing Street, while Clement Attlee and Margaret Thatcher had to wait around five years.