THE DISCLOSURE of private papers belonging to Labour’s Ed Balls covering efforts to push Tony Blair from 10 Downing Street in 2005 has prompted an official inquiry, following allegations they were leaked by the Conservatives.
The papers graphically illustrate the rancorous relations between Mr Blair and Gordon Brown, though it can be doubted they add anything new to what is already known, with the latter describing one letter from Mr Blair as “shallow”, “inconsistent” and “muddled”.
In 2006, Mr Blair proposed that Mr Brown would take the lead in reform of the Labour Party, democratic renewal and in work to tackle Islamic extremism, while Mr Blair demanded support for his efforts to reform public services.
In reply, Mr Brown and Mr Balls, who was then in cabinet but still a close ally of Mr Brown, demanded Mr Brown should have a veto over cabinet reshuffles and take Mr Blair’s place at some international gatherings.
Mr Balls is claiming he left the papers behind in the Department of Children, Schools and Families after he left office in May 2010, though this has been greeted with incredulity by some in the House of Commons last night.
On the orders of cabinet secretary Gus O’Donnell, the Cabinet Office is now investigating if the papers were left behind and “if so, whether there have been any breaches of document security within government”, a spokesman for prime minister David Cameron said yesterday.
The inquiry began after an official complaint from Mr Balls: "The last time I saw them was when they were on my desk in the department. I don't know how they were taken and got to the Telegraph," he told the BBC.
Despite his deserved reputation as a political bruiser, Mr Balls claimed yesterday he had tried to “hold things together” given the serious difficulties between Mr Blair and Mr Brown, who had long yearned for the No 10 role.
“I lived through these years. I know what happens when people allow personalities and debates and fights to get in the way of the national interest. I was part of trying to hold things together in difficult times,” he said.
“There are important lessons to learn – people want to know that the Labour Party has learned them. We have, 100 per cent. That is why we are not going to be diverted by these kind of false and mendacious allegations.”
Meanwhile, Conservative education secretary Michael Gove has rejected Mr Balls’s attempts to blame him for the leak of the letters: “Ed Balls is pathetically trying to blame officials. He should ask friends how these things got leaked,” said a Gove official.
The disclosure of the letters has a current significance since they show that Labour leader Ed Miliband, another close Brown ally at the time, was deeply involved in the exchanges between the two sides.
Rejecting the Daily Telegraph'scoverage of the documents as "an overhyped version of history", Mr Miliband yesterday said: "Frankly the era of Blair and Brown is over and we're a party looking outwards to the country, not looking inwards and talking to ourselves, and that's the way it's going to be under my leadership."
Also revealed was a letter from Mr Blair to Mr Brown setting out his proposals for an orderly transfer of power, but demanding that the chancellor work with him to avoid a “breakdown” and warning: “The division at the top is killing us.”
In his characteristic block capital handwriting, Mr Brown scrawled “shallow, inconsistent, muddled” over the top of the note. (Additional reporting: PA)
