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A day is a long time in politics

• Nick
• 8 Nov 06, 08:43 PM

You could forgive the prime minister for feeling a little down after a day like today. He's always known that two issues had the power to scar his last months in office - loans and Iraq. Tonight both loom large.

His friends say bitterly that he'll probably only learn what the police have in store for him from leaks to the media. After his aides and his Cabinet, Tony Blair surely knows that he'll be next to help the police with their enquiries.

Neither he nor his allies have been charged with anything - let alone found guilty. They are furious that he faces the court of public opinion without being able to make his defence. Yet they know that the merest hint of a prosecution would be politically deadly.

Some ministers hope that the police's spraying of letters around the Cabinet table suggests they're on a fishing trip for evidence they need and have yet to find. There is an alternative, less reassuring explanation. It is that Yates of the Yard - the policeman in charge of the investigation - is haunted by the failure of another high profile case he once led. The Burrell trial collapsed when the Palace changed its evidence at the last minute. Today's letters may be designed to ensure that no-one can spring a similar surprise on Yates again.

As for Iraq, the prime minister now finds himself having to second guess not just George Bush and his new defence secretary, not just the Baker Commission into Iraq but also a newly assertive Congress. It maybe that he will succeed in making Britain's voice heard in the re-shaping of strategy on Iraq. On the other hand he may struggle to be heard. In that case Britain could face the nightmare, one of his Cabinet colleagues suggested to me, of being the last left insisting that there's no need to change course in Iraq.

Meantime, some in the Labour Party will be wondering whether they could face the same fate as the Republicans in elections next May if their leader's still in Downing Street. Tony Blair has promised to leave soon after but for some that simply won't be soon enough.

A few weeks ago a close colleague of the prime minister's told me that 7 November would prove to be one of the the most important dates in the British political calender. I'm beginning to work out what he meant.

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Letters received

• Nick
• 8 Nov 06, 03:31 PM

Not one letter, but many.

Having started the day refusing to comment on an ongoing police enquiry, ministers are beginning to confirm whether they have or have not had letters from the police. The signs are that all members of the Cabinet at the time of the last election received letters - though I have not been able yet to confirm every name.

Some members of the current Cabinet have not received letters.

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Investigation continues

• Nick
• 8 Nov 06, 10:56 AM

Gordon Brown is not about to be interviewed by police investigating the cash-for-honours allegations. He has, though, received a letter which has been sent to a number of other senior Labour figures asking them to declare what they knew about loans made to party funds in the run-up to the campaign and the subsequent nomination of lenders for peerages. Gordon Brown's answer will be "nothing" and that's why he's unlikely to be interviewed by police.

I can reveal though that , who was Labour's election supremo, has already been interviewed by the police. This followed his interview with Andrew Marr in April who asked him "Did you know about any of these loans, I mean you were the man spending the money at the time. You were in charge at the time, weren't you?"

Milburn replied: "I was told in the middle of the campaign that the party had taken a lot out, I didn't know whether they were from my, my concern was more about spending money, frankly, than raising it." (Read .)

The officer in charge of the investigation, John Yates, has told MPs that "you go where the evidence takes you". Just like after a car crash the police interview everyone who might have seen what happened - whether, as one of those close to the investigation puts it, they are political leaders or billionaires.

It is for this reason that Gordon Brown and others are receiving letters. It is for this reason that the prime minister's friends expect him to be interviewed by police - possibly under caution - in the weeks to come.

Coming together with last night's election defeats for George Bush - which are bound to alter the course of the US's strategy on Iraq - it demonstrates how little control Tony Blair has over his current fate.

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