I’d like to start this piece off by saying that although like many others I voted for Tony Blair in 1997, primarily because of the problems that the Tories were having, I ended up being swiftly disappointed with the man. This disappointment was not completely down to the subject of the Iraq War, an issue that I ended up seeing two sides of both pro and anti, but down to the damage that he and his party did to the structure of the United Kingdom. This damage ranged from the opening of Britain’s borders, the ‘reforms’ of the House of Lords that increased the number of Blair’s political cronies in it, the creation of the Supreme Court, the politicisation of state entities such as the police and the general sleaze that his government ended up involved in.

I’m not a Tony Blair fan, I can assure you of that. However I will not be joining in with the thousands of people who are losing their minds over Blair being knighted. The reason for not thinking in this way is that giving high honours to former heads of government is not unprecedented, in fact it’s quite usual. Let’s just look at the history shall we, relatively recent history from the end of World War II.

Clement Attlee, the Labour architect of the welfare state became the first Earl Attlee a hereditary title. In 1953 Winston Churchill was knighted under the Order of the Garter. Anthony Eden the PM whose name is most closely associated with the Suez Crisis was given an Earldom in 1961. Harold Macmillan was created Earl of Stockton in 1984. Harold Wilson made Baron Wilson of Rievaulx and a Knight of the Garter. Edward Heath was Knighted as was Sir John Major and Margaret Thatcher was elevated to the House of Lords as Baroness Thatcher of Kesteven.

Some of those former Prime Ministers who were either ennobled or knighted were just as controversial as Tony Blair was. Attlee engaged in an orgy of state control of industry and services, Eden with the aforementioned Suez Crisis, Macmillan had the Profumo Affair and sleaze, Wilson had industrial strife and massive economic problems, Heath took Britain into the European Union, Major’s government was mired in sleaze and Margaret Thatcher’s government was probably one of the most radical governments since the War.

With all these Prime Ministers there is something negative to say about their governments, just as there is a lot that is negative to say about the Blair government. We are hearing more about people’s dissatisfaction with the Blair knighthood because there is not the ability via social media to hear about it. Back when Baroness Thatcher was ennobled in the 1990’s there was a similar amount of disquiet among those who opposed her and her government, but it was not voiced as loudly as is the disquiet about Blair’s knighthood, because there was not the ability to do so.

If the Blair knighthood was something unprecedented then I would say that there would be good reason to kick off. But there is not. It’s perfectly normal for former heads of governments to be honoured. Maybe those who are kicking off about Blair getting a knighthood should stop to consider that to a large extent he’s not been honoured to the same extent as Thatcher or Wilson or Eden and been given a seat in the House of Lords. It could be worse. We could be seeing Blair slithering is way onto the red benches rather than being given a mere knighthood.

As much as I dislike Blair, giving him a knighthood is nothing unusual, in fact it is normally the least that can be expected for a former Prime Minister. As with many others out there at present, I would have liked Blair to be passed over for an honour of this nature due to the damage that his government did to the UK and this man’s personal reputation. Unfortunately for this to happen the Monarch would have had to depart from convention and refuse the honour thereby involving herself in party politics. Granting Blair his knighthood sticks in the craw somewhat but the alternative which is for the Monarch to make a political decision to refuse and thereby causing a damaging constitutional crisis, could be much worse.