Ed Davey: Tony Blair would be the wrong person for the wrong job

Over at The Independent, Ed Davey writes about the possibility of Tony Blair becoming the European Union’s next President. He’s not keen on the idea:

It’s a long-standing gripe of pro-Europeans that historically Britain has played a poor hand in Europe. Too often disdainful, disengaged or domestically divided, Labour and the Tories have sold the country short. For different reasons, their posturing over Blair’s presidential ambitions is in danger of throwing away another golden opportunity for Britain.

Labour’s push for Blair is wrong on two counts. Firstly, he is simply too soiled for export. His disastrous decision to side with President Bush over the invasion of Iraq was horribly divisive in Europe. All those wounds will be re-opened when Blair faces the Chilcott inquiry into the Iraq war. The vast majority of Europeans who opposed the war will no doubt watch those hearings in bafflement if this man becomes a senior European figure again.

You can read Ed Davey’s full piece here.