A generation is widely considered to be 25 years, meaning that a generation has now passed since Tony Blair became Britain's Prime Minister in 1997. I feel, that for better and worse, Blair's premiership has significantly shaped the Britain we live in today.
To try to start on a positive note, I feel that the "Levelling Up" still technically championed by the current Conservative government, but more closely associated with Boris Johnson, can be largely traced from the Blair era. A need for "Levelling Up" at all seemed to be a negative consequence of the Margaret Thatcher era. Whilst the changes made by her government made the economy more efficient and successful, it was a job that was seemingly half done: whilst the successful areas of the economy (and parts of the country they were based in) were able to thrive; insufficient steps were taken to compensate for the winding down of unsuccessful aspects of the economy (and, as a result, the parts of the country they were based in). This created a clear "have" and "have not" division across the UK, something which the Blair government seemed set to overcome, looking to reduce that gap. Then, starting with David Cameron's government's discussion of a "Northern Powerhouse" to encourage growth in the north of the country, Boris Johnson would then encourage this development on a broader scale as "Levelling Up", which Johnson's successors have said they want to continue to support.
And now for the more controversial legacies of the Blair era. In terms of British foreign policy, and military involvement in particular, they have marked a significant reaction against the approach taken by Tony Blair's government ever since. Blair advocated an active foreign policy, encouraging a moralistic stance of encouraging the good and opposing the bad, with the latter handled by a relatively great willingness to use Britain's armed forces. This was most obviously, and controversially, demonstrated with the deployment of armed forces to Afghanistan and Iraq. The great length of this involvement, the regular loss of life, and questionable final success, have appeared to restrain Blair's successors from taking a similar approach when other opportunities have since arisen. During the "Arab Spring", whilst David Cameron favoured involvement in Libya's Civil War, he was keen to emphasise there would not be British soldiers actively fighting there (or "boots on the ground", as it's often described), then parliament (in an apparent reflection of public opinion) opposed Cameron's later proposal for greater involvement in the Syrian Civil War. Meanwhile, though there have been significant displays of military support from British governments for Ukraine with the ongoing Russian invasion, there has been no talk of any significant "boots on the ground" being deployed from Britain.
Devolution is another major legacy of Tony Blair's, having introduced a devolved parliament and assembly to Scotland and Wales respectively. This was apparently intended to calm nationalism in these Home Nations of the UK. However, nationalism gathered much greater momentum after devolution- and arguably due to devolution. While both the Scottish parliament and Welsh assembly started out as bodies dominated by Labour politicians (still the case in the Welsh assembly), this shifted in Scotland as the Scottish National Party (SNP) took over, and calls for an independence referendum grew impossible to ignore. Even after the referendum on independence, the issue still seemed to dominate Scottish politics for the decade since, with the SNP remaining the most popular and powerful party in Scotland since, with calls for a further independence referendum continuing to be made. Meanwhile, it is said that separatism in Wales has also been relatively high since the Welsh assembly was created, and English nationalism also emerged as a distinct movement, notably revolving around calls for an English parliament. This was to address the anomaly of Scottish/Welsh/ Northern Irish MPs still being able to vote on English issues, while the reverse was no longer the case for English MPs, due to the devolved institutions of the other Home Nations. Having said this, David Cameron appeared to address this with the "English votes for English laws" principle, so that Scottish/Welsh/ Northern Irish MPs could no longer vote on English only matters.
Tying back with the topic mentioned earlier of Blair's original "Levelling Up" to reduce the gaps in wealth in the UK; a large amount of the funding for this great investment came from significant borrowing. The issue of government borrowing forming a large part of the government's spending, and the interest on this borrowing becoming one of the largest expenses of UK governments, formed a central issue in the 2010 election that brought David Cameron's Conservatives into government. Although Cameron's government was associated with significant cuts to spending to address this, and Theresa May after him seemingly looking to carefully manage government finances; Boris Johnson appeared to return to the bigger spending the British had got used to under the Labour government, most clearly during the pandemic, with the government's generous offers of support (but causing debt to hugely amass once again). Since then, Britain's leaders have struggled with how to reduce the national debt without upsetting the public too much. With cuts already previously carried out under Cameron, the short-lived government of Liz Truss believed short-term borrowing could be used to spur an economy that could ultimately fund itself; however, it seems that there was insufficient confidence in this approach, leading to Rishi Sunak's subsequent government using higher taxes to cover government spending. However, with both tax demands and national debt being quite exceptionally high, one wonders how long this approach can continue. It seems governments will have to either ween the British public off the large and expensive state they have grown used to- or find alternative ways of funding it.
Immigration is also a major legacy of the Blair government. It was during that time that net migration of hundreds of thousands of people to the UK per year became the norm instead of tens of thousands. Also, as members of the European Union (EU) at the time, while other members tended to be more cautious and restricted arrivals from the new EU member states in 2004 (all largely poorer than existing members), Blair's Britain did no such thing, seeing exceptionally large numbers of arrivals to the UK. It was at this time that immigration evolved from a fringe concern to a mainstream issue, as illustrated by the rise of the UK Independence Party (primarily concerned with immigration and leaving the EU) from obscurity to one of the UK's leading parties (most popular in the European Parliament, and coming second in many results for parliamentary seats in 2015, suggesting that popularity would have continued to grow had a referendum on EU membership not been held). Therefore, with the actions of Blair's government overseeing the drastic escalation of immigration, it could be said that Blair was the father of Brexit.
To conclude, there is one specific aspect of current British politics which combines two of Blair's legacies. Throughout the Brexit process, Norther Ireland has been a focus. This is because of its unique position of being politically united with the UK, yet geographically united with the EU via its border with the Republic of Ireland. Management of this position owes much to the Good Friday Agreement, overseen by Blair's government, which was widely deemed a success in significantly reducing tensions and violence among Catholic and Protestant communities in Northern Ireland. However, Northern Ireland has had to adjust its relationships with the EU, Republic of Ireland as a result of Brexit. In the years ahead, we will see how the various debates of modern Britain, for which the seeds were sown in the Blair era, continue to evolve.
