Britain: It was back to the future yesterday as Michael Howard and Tony Blair palpably enjoyed their first clash at Prime Minister's Questions, writesFrank Millar, London Editor
Forget high-minded notions about question time eliciting information and enlightening the public. This was good old-fashioned fisticuffs of the bloodied nose and blackened eye variety. And it left Labour as well as Tory MPs in cheerful anticipation of many bruising encounters to come in the build-up to the next election.
Mr Blair was first on the offensive after an opening question from Mr Howard about the government's rising administrative costs. Welcoming his new adversary, the prime minister professed himself delighted "that someone written off under the last Conservative government is now given the chance to rehabilitate himself under Labour".
Side-stepping Mr Howard's invitation to confirm health costs were up by one-third, Mr Blair listed Labour's achievements - increased primary and cancer care, 24 major new hospitals, 50,000 more nurses - courtesy of extra spending which the Tories had opposed. He then compared this to the record of the last Conservative government with its opposition to the minimum wage, an extra million unemployed, and record numbers locked in negative equity on 15 per cent interest rates.
"You don't simply represent the past. You would take us back to the past. Same old people, same old policies, same old Tories," declared Mr Blair.
However, Mr Howard was well-prepared and happy to talk about the past. Mr Blair's past to be precise. "I've got a great big dossier on your past and I didn't even have to sex it up," he replied, hinting darkly of the confrontation to come over the Hutton Report on the death of Dr David Kelly.
Tory MPs were delighted as their new champion dipped into it. "We can talk about your personal pledge to leave the EU. We can talk about the time you criticised America's 'state-sponsored terrorism' - I wonder if you will be raising that with President Bush next week? Or we can talk about the time you praised the fortitude and resolve of the Wapping strikers. I bet you don't remind Rupert Murdoch about that," Mr Howard taunted back.
As Mr Howard declared his willingness to debate the past any day of the week, the thought occurred that Mr Blair might soon take him up on his proposal that they instead concentrate on "today and tomorrow (rather) than yesterday". The Major government's record is one thing. But there could be danger in too much focus on a Conservative past which includes a famous woman whose natural successor, some thought, was not Mr Major but . . . Tony Blair.
There was another hint of danger, too - and a warning to Labour dissidents - as Mr Howard returned to the present and the latest falling out between Mr Blair and Chancellor Gordon Brown. Why had it been necessary for the prime minister's spokesman to describe this relationship as one of the great strengths of the government, wondered Mr Howard. And wasn't it "an absolute disgrace" that they should be squabbling over a seat on Labour's National Executive Committee at a time when people were feeling let down over schools, hospitals and crime.
This provoked Mr Blair into a public tribute to Mr Brown, whose chancellorship he again compared with that of the previous Conservative government. "It is not just your record in government we are going to be discussing," promised Mr Blair: "It is your policies now."
However, this contained the hint of a third danger area. Getting under the skin of Labour's personality clashes is a clever way of silencing noisy government backbenchers. It also has the potential to open up the policy rift between Mr Blair and Mr Brown over whether Labour should seek a third term by tacking further to the right - with its own Conservative-sounding promises of reform- or by opening up a clearer ideological divide with the Tories by way of greater emphasis on Labour rather than "New Labour" values.
So, suddenly, there is the sense of a serious policy debate between the parties, and one which casts intriguing light on the internal debate of Britain's governing party. Mr Howard promises to give it cutting-edge. The Tories still appear light years from forming a government. But for the first time, really, Mr Blair faces a serious opposition. And as the prime minister is forced to raise his game, politics as a whole will be seen to benefit from the Tory leadership coup.