Blair can't escape Iraq questions

Analysis
By Nick Assinder
Political correspondent, BBC News website

Tony Blair wanted to talk about ID - and that's what he got.

Mr Blair did not mention Saddam in opening remarks

Not, unfortunately for him perhaps, identity cards but, once again, the Iraq dilemma.

There was some general surprise that, the day after Saddam Hussein was sentenced to death, the prime minister chose not to mention the issue in his opening remarks, preferring to go over, at length, all the old arguments about ID cards.

But question after question focused instead on the other ID and, in particular, whether the prime minister wanted to see Saddam executed or not.

And it all got pretty ill-tempered, particularly when questioners insisted on coming back at the prime minister with follow up questions - something he habitually slaps down, saying he is not there to be interviewed.

What the questioners wanted to know was, bearing in mind the government's opposition to the death penalty, did he want to see Saddam executed.

"We are against the death penalty, whether it's Saddam or anybody else," he finally snapped back, before going on to say the verdict allowed people to focus on Iraq's brutal past under Saddam and, presumably, how much better things are now.

New ruling

What the prime minister would not do, however, was get into the sort of language used by George Bush, that the verdict represented a milestone or a turning point.

Saddam faces execution

His reluctance to do so is probably born out of bitter experience and the likelihood that any such expressions of optimism now may well be used against him the next time there is an atrocity in Iraq.

"I have become very cautious about declaring turning points," he confessed.

Just, it seems, as cautious as he is about talking about the police inquiry into the alleged cash for peerages row, which may see him interviewed by officers over coming weeks.

On that issue, he even laid down a rather odd new ruling.

"My spokesman answers questions on that every day. I will leave it to him," he decreed.

So do we now have a position where the prime minister's official spokesman speaks for the prime minister, rather than the prime minister speaking for the prime minister?

Well, on some issues, somebody has to.