- The Observer,
- Sunday April 27 2003
He is not like the Mrs Thatcher type politician who clatters her convictions on the table and orders everybody to follow suit. He is much more, and always has been, a persuader by nature. And, being a persuader, he isn't constantly confronting and ordering people around. But when I'm asked: "Did you realise that this man was going to become Prime Minister?" I say no, it never occurred to me when I first met him. The other slightly contradictory aspect [of his personality] is that he is incredibly impatient. Because he is not aggressive, that is initially a quite disguised personal attribute. He'll spend a lot of time finding out all the facts in relation to it and then when he picks a solution and he's gone through it all, he'll get quite impatient if the solution is not then delivered quickly.
Of course there have been difficulties. Personal stuff, the Cherie stuff, the MMR stuff. I suppose you have to accept that friends and family get done over. It doesn't make it any less painful, but he accepts it goes with the territory.
He's been extraordinarily protective of his family, keen to keep them out of the limelight. Probably, like everybody, he hoped they wouldn't have to pay the price, but they have paid the price. I think he accepts the inevitability of that, but it doesn't make it any less difficult when it happens, and it is his job that leads to it happening. It was as painful for him to see Cherie under fire [over Carole Caplin and her relationship with Peter Foster]. She was under fire because she was the Prime Minister's wife and there was very little Tony could do to defend her.
