Tony Blair/Timelines

1983

Tony Blair is elected as Labour MP for Sedgefield, in a general election that is won convincingly by Margaret Thatcher's Conservative Party. Michael Foot, the left-wing leader of the Labour Party resigns, and is replaced by Neill Kinnock.

1984 to 1987

New Labour party leader Neil Kinnock appoints Blair as Assistant Spokesman on Treasury matters. Blair aligns himself with the reformers within the party.

1987

Appointed Deputy spokesman for Trade and Industry.

1988

October: Elected as shadow secretary of state for energy.

1989

Elected Member of the National Executive Committee of the Labour party.

1992

Promoted to shadow Home Secretary by new Labour Leader John Smith. Blair pledges that his party would be "tough on crime" and on "the causes of crime".

1994

12 May: John Smith dies of a heart attack.

31 May: Tony Blair and and Gordon Brown meet at the Granita restaurant in Islington, London, and reportedly agree a deal about the leadership of the Labour Party.

1 June: Gordon Brown rules himself out of the Labour Party leadership race.

21 July: Tony Blair beats John Prescott and Margaret Beckett to become leader of the Labour Party. John Prescott is elected as his Deputy.

October: Blair makes his first party conference speech as leader.

1995

April: The Labour Party backs rewriting of Clause IV of its constitution, the clause that formerly committed the party to nationalisation of industry.

1997

March The Sun newspaper announces that it will back Blair at the general election.

1 May: Labour wins the general election by a landslide (419 of 659 seats). At 44, Tony Blair becomes the second-youngest British prime minister.

Blair's Chancellor, Gordon Brown grants the Bank of England the freedom to set interest rates without consulting the government.

June Britain signs the European Union's "Social Chapter"

August Tony Blair reflects the mood of the nation on the death, in a traffic accident in France, of Princess Diana. He calls her "the people's princess."

September A referendum in Scotland backs devolution; a referendum in Wales follows a week later, and also backs devolution, but only narrowly.

October Gordon Brown rules out the immediate prospects of Britain joining the euro setting five key economic tests that must first be met.

Blair meets Gerry Adams, the head of Sinn Fein, the political wing of the Irish Republican Army (IRA).

1998

April: Blair negotiates the Belfast Agreement ("The Good Friday Agreement") creating a power-sharing assembly in Northern Ireland.

May: Referendum to create a new assembly for London and establish direct elections for mayor.

Britain, as part of NATO, joins in the Kosovo war. Britain keeps thousands of troops there as part of a peacekeeping force.

2000

4 May Labour rebel Ken Livingstone wins the first London Mayoral election.

20 May: Leo Blair is born; the first child born to a sitting Prime Minister for more than 150 years.

2001

June: Labour wins another landslide general election, winning 413 of the 659 seats in the House of Commons, but the voter turnout is only 59 per cent. Conservative leader William Hague swifly resigns.

September: After the Sept. 11 attacks on the USA, Blair emerges as the strongest ally of President Bush's administration, supporting its "war on terror." In October, British and American forces enter Afghanistan to overthrow the Taliban regime and to weaken the al-Qaeda terrorist network.

13 September: Right winger Iain Duncan Smith beats Ken Clarke to replace William Hague as Conservative Party leader.

Blair unveils an intelligence dossier (later to be called the "dodgy dossier"), and claims that it shows that Iraq could deploy banned weapons "within 45 minutes".

2003

Blair argues for the overthrow of Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein, based mainly on his alleged possession of weapons of mass destruction.

15 February: An estimated million people march through London to oppose war with Iraq.

March 16: Blair, Bush and Spanish Premier Jose Maria Aznar announce they will seek support for military action against Iraq.

March 19: Britain sends 45,000 troops and joins the U.S.-led "coalition of the willing" invasion of Iraq. The Iraqi regime falls after three weeks, and British troops remain in Iraq, mainly based around Basra in the south of the country.

July: David Kelly, a biological warfare expert with the British Ministry of Defence, is found dead of an apparent suicide. Kelly was the unnamed source of a BBC report claiming the government had "sexed up" a dossier on illegal weapons in Iraq to boost public support for the invasion. In early July, Defence Secretary Geoff Hoon had exposed Kelly as the source of the BBC report.

August: An inquiry into Kelly's death and the circumstances leading up to it begins, led by Lord Hutton.

2004

Jan. 28: The Hutton Report determines that Kelly took his own life, and that the BBC allegations were unfounded. The chairman and director-general of the BBC, and Andrew Gilligan, the journalist who made the allegations, all resign.

February: Blair names a panel to conduct an inquiry into pre-war intelligence, led by Lord Butler.

July: Butler's report criticises the intelligence basis for claims that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction. It says the assertion that Iraq could use weapons of mass destruction within 45 minutes was unsubstantiated. However, the report found no evidence the intelligence had been manipulated by Blair and his aides.

2005

April 5th: Blair calls a general election, one year earlier than he needs to.

May 5th: Blair becomes the first leader of the Labour party to win three consecutive terms as prime minister. The Labour Party defeats Michael Howard's Conservative Party comfortably, but with a much reduced majority overall of 64 seats.

2006

6 January Charles Kennedy resigns as leader of the Liberal Democrats after admitting to a drink problem. He is replaced, on 2 March, by Menzies Campbell.

15 March Tony Blair gains endorsement by the House of Commons test of controversial school reform plans, but only because of Conservative support; 52 Labour backbenchers rebelled and another 25 did not vote.

16 March Labour's treasurer Jack Dromey reveals he did not know that the party had secretly borrowed millions of pounds from businessmen. He said the Electoral Commission should investigate the issue of loans to political parties from noncommercial sources. Home Secretary Charles Clarke denies that money had been borrowed in exchange for promises of honours ("cash for honours").

4 May Labour loses more than 300 councillors in local government elections in England, one of the worst local election results in Labour's history.

12 July Lord Levy is arrested and bailed by police as part of their investigation of the "cash for honours" allegations. Lord Levy, who was Tony Blair's chief fundraiser, denied any wrongdoing and accuses the police of using their arrest powers "totally unnecessarily". (No charges are ever brought).

6 September Reports of an "acrimonious meeting" between Blair and Brown over the succession issue are followed by the resignation of a junior minister and seven government aides who had urged Mr Blair to resign.

12 September Blair's last speech to the Trades Union Congress.

26 September Final speech as leader of the Labour Party at the party conference.

14 December Police interview Blair about cash for honours affair.

2007

May 9th: Ian Paisley is sworn in as the First Minister of the Northern Ireland Assembly. Martin McGuinness, once a prominent IRA commander, is his deputy.

May 10th: Official announcement that Blair will resign as Prime Minister on June 27th

June 27th: Last appearance by Tony Blair in the House of Commons, for Prime Minister's question time. The session ends with an unprecedented 2-minute standing ovation from all members of the House of Commons, political friends and foes alike.

Sources

• Times online: The Blair years'
• CNN: 'Tony Blair timeline'
• Financial Times:22 'Blair’s career highlights'
• CBC News: 'Tony Blair's political career - a timeline'
• BBC News: 'Timeline: The Blair Years'
• BBC News: 'Timeline: Blair vs Brown'