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NEVER MIND THE POLITICS
(Evening Standard Via Thomson Dialog NewsEdge) THE CHAIRMAN He has a huge mortgage, and his children are still at school or university.
His wife may have a well-paid job of her own. But he knows that when he takes early retirement, he's still going to be the main breadwinner. So what, then, does the future hold for Tony Blair after Downing Street? As the PM finally managed to join his family on their annual Barbados jaunt this week, the holiday away from current world crises will give Mr Blair further time to consider his options. Earlier this month, his ongoing 'will I, won't I?'
tussle with Chancellor Gordon Brown about when he will finally hand over the keys to Number 10 took a new turn. The PM is said to have told friends he wants to stay in Downing Street 'for at least another year'.
That, of course, is just putting off the inevitable.
Now aged 53, what other jobs could he possibly do?
Who, after Iraq, would want him? Will he simply write his memoirs - with a reported GBP4 million advance promised to him? Or has Mr Blair one other card up his sleeve? Below ES considers the options for a man in search of a job.
If Mr Blair's controversial California trip earlier this month was, as some described it, 'the showiest job application of all time', much of the press coverage made mention of Lord Browne, chief executive of British Petroleum, one of Britain's largest companies.
Lord Browne - a smooth-talking networker who has cleverly used his contacts with Downing Street - also employs Anji Hunter, Mr Blair's former 'gatekeeper' at Number 10.
In California two weeks ago, Lord Browne joined Mr Blair and Sir Richard Branson at a conference on climate change.
But the media missed the most fascinating, and potentially crucial, link between Downing Street and BP. The man in question is Peter Sutherland, BP's chairman. If Mr Blair has a future in international commerce, in itself a highly controversial prospect, it is the rotund Mr Sutherland whom he will emulate, rather than the slender Lord Browne.
The similarities between the two men are striking: both are former lawyers; both have served in high-profile government jobs, though Mr Sutherland hardly has the stature of the Prime Minister.
But of particular interest to Mr Blair is the fact that Mr Sutherland has combined a world-reaching business role with a formidable hand in geopolitics.
In fact, flick through Mr Sutherland's CV and it reads like a wish list for Tony. He is an Irishman, and a former Attorney General of Ireland. But after party politics in his home country, he served as a EU commissioner. He went on to become Director-General of GATT, the organisation that polices worldwide trading deals, particularly between Europe and the US. Like Mr Blair, he is a renowned negotiator; he has also held the position of director general of the World Trade Organization, before moving lucratively into banking and, ultimately, BP.
Alongside Lord Browne, his chief executive, there is no question that, now he is in his sixties, Mr Sutherland may consider stepping down in the near future. Could Mr Blair slip effortlessly into his shoes? Certainly, the money is right. Although he has spent over 15 years in the business world, his success has been notable, to put it mildly. In that time, he has built up a GBP150 million fortune, not bad when you consider the Blairs' outstanding mortgage. Apart from BP, he is also chairman of Goldman Sachs International and is said at one point to have had a stake in the banking firm worth GBP87.5 million alone. Intriguingly, Mr Sutherland, in what will further light up Mr Blair's eyes, has combined a career in business with a strong political role.
He has been Goodwill Ambassador to UNIDO. Earlier this year, Kofi Annan personally appointed him Special Representative for Migration, after he'd already served on the Commission for Human Security. What further attracts Mr Blair to BP is that the global firm trumpets its humanitarian and environmental credentials: in 2005, the company gave nearly $100 million to good causes.
There is one snag, however. According to senior head-hunters in London, Mr Blair has little hope of landing a cushy boardroom job. Curly Moloney, managing director of Moloney Search, attended a seminar in Downing Street last year on high-profile job recruitment, particularly for women. She doesn't hold out much hope for Mr Blair. 'I think he'll struggle to get anything good,' she said. 'No one knows how good a manager he is. I think people will be a little bit reluctant to take him on board.
He's such a huge name: shareholders might not welcome it, and these days they have such power.
And, by having so big a name, you are inevitably courting controversy. It always comes back and bites you.' If a company does come forward to offer Mr Blair a directorship, the remuneration, at least according to insiders, could be surprisingly small.
A non-executive chairman of a top 100 company in the UK would earn around GBP500,000 for roughly 50 days' work a year but there are few of those jobs currently going begging. A lesser directorship would pull in less than GBP75,000.
But then as Ms Moloney adds: 'I'm sure there are enough bankers out there who might be happy to take him on board. We do know he likes businessmen.'
Places to be seen Handing out his CV outside Bank Tube station.
Earnings Cherie won't be pleased.
The five-storey, redbrick pile in Chelsea is not the sort of home you'd expect to be important to Tony Blair. It was once the base of Victorian society portrait painter John Singer Sargent, the Lucian Freud of his day. It was also in this high-ceiling former artists' studio that the late Diana, Princess of Wales sat for one of few official portraits.
But what makes this Chelsea abode of particular relevance to Mr Blair is the couple who own it: Lady Lynn Forrester de Rothschild and her financier husband, Sir Evelyn. She is the American, ubiquitous networker whose legion of friends includes virtually every former president, statesman and high-rolling chief executive you could care to mention. Her husband is part of the eponymous Rothschild banking clan.
And when it comes to Mr Blair launching himself as a 'world stage' speaker and publicising his memoirs, this attractive, no-nonsense blonde will more than likely be one of the figures holding his hand. To that end, Lynn has a formidable record of doing exactly that for other political heavyweights. Two years ago, she threw a champagne-fuelled private party for her great friend New York Senator Hillary Clinton at Kensington Palace. Mrs Clinton was in London to launch her autobiography, accompanied by Bill.
First, of course, Mr Blair will have to finish the memoirs. Earlier this month, he was said to have shaken hands on a GBP4 million book deal with Murdoch-owned publishers Random House: the company is headed by Gail Rebuck, whose husband Philip Gould just happens to be Mr Blair's longstanding strategist. They also published Cherie Blair's book on Downing Street wives, The Goldfish Bowl, and Bill Clinton's autobiography.
Royalties and appearances associated with the book would, it is claimed, earn Mr Blair as much as GBP20 million within five years of leaving Number 10.
This will help pay off the reported 75 per cent mortgage the Blairs have on their GBP3.6 million Connaught Square home, a financial deal said to have been staked on his future earnings.
In this scenario, Mr Blair would combine a semi-official world role with a freewheeling and lucrative lecture-circuit act that would take him around the world.
Which brings us back to the Chelsea artists' studio. Because Lady F de R, as she is known to her friends, will be vital for helping to establish Mr Blair as a perennial main guest speaker at worldwide conferences, possibly raking in GBP100,000 a month. She is involved in a myriad liberal think-tanks and conferences, a kind of Pied Piper for the third way crowd so beloved by Mr Blair. Her husband Sir Evelyn is said to have bankrolled, to the tune of GBP250,000, Peter Mandelson's think-tank, Policy Network.
'If Blair wants to make it on the lecture circuit as some kind of talking-head ambassador, Lynn is a woman who can make it happen,' one former Clinton White House staffer told me.
Interestingly, while Mr Blair's support for President Bush and the Iraq War has angered many of the Democratic crowd in the US, it has not harmed his reputation as much as in the UK.
And, once again, Lady F de R will be crucial: despite her left-leaning credentials, she, too, has cleverly forged good working relationships with the Bush White House. At the Live 8 concert in Hyde Park last year, she was on the phone to allpowerful White House aide, Karl Rove, to iron out problems about TV coverage in America.
Also crucial for Mr Blair is Washington-based lawyer Vernon Jordan. He is, famously, the 'Friend of Bill' who advised former White House intern Monica Lewinsky about 'her career' after the dalliance with Clinton in the White House.
Jordan remains a powerful and lucrative Washington/New York contact. Others of use to Mr Blair in this circle include stalwart New York Democrat and fundraiser Maureen White and her financier husband Steve Rattner. Both are also friends of Lady F de R. The couple's galleried New York apartment, overlooking Central Park and the Metropolitan Museum of Art, is the in place to launch your book. Expect Bill, Hillary et al to be at Tony's party there.
Places to be seen The Larry King Show; World Economic Forum in Davos; environmental seminars in Delhi; News International conferences in Australia/America.
Earnings John Major is said to have earned GBP1 million from his memoirs and speaking engagements in the first year after leaving Downing Street. Mr Blair is more Mick Jagger to Major's Bill Wyman, so he could earn at least five times that figure in one year alone.
When Bill Clinton was asked recently on BBC's Newsnight to comment on the prospect of Mr Blair possibly becoming the next Secretary-General of the United Nations, he gave a fascinating reply: 'That would suit me. He would be a good one.' Note the 'that would suit me'. Because, after Downing Street, there is the possibility, still talked about by former Clinton White House aides, that the Bill 'n' Tony show could hit the road once more. Mr Blair has never denied the possibility, although he did once laugh about the prospect.
'Oh God, it will be like the Everly Brothers back on tour.' Yes, Mr Blair's closeness to President Bush has privately angered many in the US. But, say these former Clinton staffers, after he has been released from the shackles of Iraq, Mr Blair will return to what the former Clintonites describe as 'his spiritual home'. By that they mean the kind of do-gooder, endless talk-shops beloved of Clinton and his acolytes. How serious is the prospect of Blair going to the UN? Well, on paper it is possible. The current incumbent, Kofi Annan, steps aside in December.
Certainly, it's a well-paid job: the salary is $293,000 a year with perks including a free mansion on Manhattan's Upper East Side, free servants, a chauffeur-driven car, first-class air travel or private jets if he can't get a flight, and 24-hour security protection. The Secretary-General also gets an additional $25,000 every year for 'personal entertainment'.
But politically, the prospect looks thin, not least given Mr Blair's remarks earlier this month that he will stay 'another year' in Downing Street, thereby possibly missing the deadline to apply for the job. With his stance on Iraq, it is also unlikely that other Security Council members, particularly France and Russia, would back a Blair candidacy. That said, it would be foolish to dismiss the possibility of Mr Blair - aided not by his current friend in the White House, but by the last occupant - taking on some kind of international role associated with the UN. It would be similar to that of former US president Jimmy Carter, who has worked alongside the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights.
Were a humanitarian or political disaster to occur - as is likely - in Palestine or Africa, as a UN 'Viceroy' Mr Blair would be parachuted in. It is also a similar role, but much sexier, to that taken on by former Lib Dem leader Paddy Ashdown during the Bosnian conflict.
Alternatively, like Clinton, who has combined his speaking engagements with a campaigning stance on AIDS, Mr Blair could become a roving ambassador for UNESCO (dismissed as 'not big enough' by one former Downing Street staffer); or a titular 'President of Europe' (laughed out of court by one Brussels observer: 'Peter Mandelson [currently a European Commissioner] wouldn't want that!' he told me).
Also against this is the fact that, like President Bush but unlike his friend Bill, Mr Blair hates being immersed in boring, bureaucratic detail.
'You've got to be thinking of some kind of stage role,' one former Labour adviser said. 'Big headlines and initiatives, but not getting bogged down in endless committees.' Which raises a different, but related, scenario. Media coverage of Mr Blair's California sojourn focused on his meetings with rap star Snoop Dogg and a legion of business tycoons, including Rupert Murdoch.
But what was not given equal coverage was a possible hidden agenda.
One Washington observer told me: 'If Blair wants to launch some kind of humanitarian Blair Foundation, it isn't really the business leaders who will be important. They will donate money but, practically, it is the policy wonks he also met in California, the liberals who organise seminars at which Blair, like Clinton, can still believe he has an influence on the world stage.' In this scenario, Mr Blair's work on the Good Friday Agreement in Northern Ireland would be trumpeted as the most important part of his CV. The snag is: 'Don't Mention the War'. Baghdad, that is, not Berlin.
Places to be seen New York, New York - the world's most liberal city, despite a Republican Mayor, and very much the Clintons' territory.
Earnings An ambassador to the UN would earn around GBP150,000 a year with perks. But it does give a cracking sequel to the memoirs.
When Mr Blair finally moves his record collection - and notorious guitar - out of Downing Street, his beloved rock'n'roll world might welcome him.
The former Mick Jagger impersonator - who once invited the Rolling Stones legend to Number 10 in his first term as PM - has a pedigree, of sorts. When U2 frontman Bono went to Downing Street a while ago, Mr Blair cringingly got out his guitar for the rock star.
'He's a pretty good guitar player; plays every day, his missus told me,' Bono said graciously. 'I checked his guitar to see if it was in tune. It was, perfectly.' On the debit side of Mr Blair's musical account, there are his links to Sir Cliff Richard and Alvin Stardust. Mr Blair has famously made use of Sir Cliff's Barbados home for summer holidays, while the PM's former special adviser and tennis partner Lord Levy, who was recently arrested by police as part of the peeragesforloans scandal, earned himself a fortune from managing saccharine musical acts such as Stardust.
On the credit side, Mr Blair has longestablished links to the British music business.
His former PA and then part-time Downing Street helper, Roz Preston, is married to John Preston, who has been a quietly influential figure in the British record business for many years. Formerly chairman of recording giant BMG, he was also a leading figure behind the Brit Awards as chairman of the British
Phonographic Industry. Preston has given Mr Blair a bit more street-cred, but only just: the artists he has worked with include the Eurythmics, Lionel Richie, Take That and Whitney Houston.
So could there really be a bright future for Mr Blair as some kind of Simon Cowell figure, ambassador for British rock music? I spoke to a number of leading managers and promoters in London. They all refused to be named, and they were all almost speechless at the suggestion. One said: 'Do you remember Rock The Vote?' That was New Labour's ill-fated attempt to rouse the youth vote at the 1997 general election.
'Do you remember,' the promoter went on, 'Cool Britannia? Having Blair on board is even naffer than holidaying with Cliff Richard.' Of course, if fate and ambition had gone differently, those same promoters might now be eating their words. Blair's Oxford University band, Ugly Rumours, played at least four gigs in the early Seventies, although former bassist and now music magazine editor Mark Ellen says the intention was 'to meet exciting girls in floral print dresses'.
Even after Downing Street, then, Mr Blair will remain wistful about his showbiz career.
But his music-business friends will keep him up to date.
It was a favourite track of record boss John Preston's, 'Cancel Today' by the acoustic duo EZIO, that Mr Blair included on his Desert Island Discs collection some years ago.
At the time, Mr Blair said: 'It is about wanting today to go away, which is usually how I feel every Tuesday and Thursday when Prime Minister's Questions comes along.' He didn't, though, quote fully from the song's lyrics. One line goes: 'And there's no work for me, no.' When it comes to the music biz, that sounds about right.
Places to be seen Celebrity X-Factor; VIP tent at Glastonbury.
Earnings A busker's pittance.
Copyright 2006 Evening Standard. Source: Financial Times Information Limited - Europe Intelligence Wire.
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