Alastair Campbell & Ryan Tubridy

Paris, 7 March 2015, 19:30 – 21:00

@ the Irish Cultural Center

At the occasion of Alastair Campbell’s newest book release, The Irish Diaries, 1994-2003, the Irish Cultural Center in Paris organized an event bringing Tony Blair’s ex-spin doctor together with famous Irish broadcaster Ryan Tubridy, host of The Late Late Show on RTÉ. As explained in the beginning, what was supposed to be a regular one-man conference – Campbell’s – turned into a more entertaining format on the advice of Tubridy: a convivial interview by him of Campbell on his book and his political life… followed by questions from the public, one of which unexpectedly attacking Campbell.

Alastair Campbell is quite something. A rather controversial character, people can be much divided on the opinion that they have of him; one thing has to be acknowledged however, whatever stance you may have: he is a colorful and interesting man, and most of all he is true to himself. His straightforwardness, a rare feature in the political arena, is a refreshing quality of his that has been underlined several times throughout the night, whether it be Tubridy or even the Irish ambassador herself.

The conversation was a very entertaining one, ranging from serious talks to enjoyable anecdotes, from political negotiations to the awful creamy-beige suit of Blair – “with black shoes!” – when Campbell first met him, while still working for The Mirror. The two men soon got along, he recalls, and at the moment of Labour’s historic election in 1997, Campbell officially – and naturally – moved from being a journalist to being head of communications of the Blair ministry. This was a big step to take, and on elections night neither Blair nor Campbell would really celebrate, for all the work it meant was ahead of them. Indeed both of them have lived and worked by the simple motto: no complacency.

The question of Northern Ireland very soon became a priority of the administration. The first speech addressing the issue was very tense – the suspicious Unionist atmosphere was almost tangible – and they worked very hard on it. The principle of consent was a major element to be taken into account. Then, negotiations took place and step by step, things became clearer. Very early on, Campbell did not care much for the media and cared about what they were actually trying to accomplish; however the media – especially the Telegraph, “they were a nightmare!” – were particularly important in the Irish context and would not make things easy.

“You have a man crush on Bill Clinton,” jokes Tubridy, “you describe him as a rock star, with brain, charisma… Why are you so taken by him?” Indeed Campbell’s fondness and admiration for Bill Clinton was obvious, even for those who had not read his book. Campbell acknowledged that things could have turned very differently if it were not for Clinton: the American president “just loved the Irish story,” he understood and was very committed to the Irish question. 

He recalled a moment, “on a G8 summit or something like that, during a rocky context in Ireland” – after verification, it was during Clinton’s Northern Ireland Assembly Speech onSeptember 3rd, 1998 in Belfast, following Omagh’s bombings a few weeks earlier. Campbell and Blair wanted Clinton to rile up Guinness and the others, by saying something like “the ball is in your court”. Clinton did it without even warning his foreign policy team: “when they asked him about that later on, he just told them “Oh don’t worry about that”!”

While the event was revolving around Irish peace negotiations, Tubridy had to ask about another major part of Blair’s public profile: Iraq. Campbell underlined the fact that he understood why people were angry with this decision. In their own defense though, they were truly confident that killing Saddam Hussein would have eased things in the Middle-East; obviously, it didn’t. “But I stand by it,” he added, “at least we tried”.

On the Middle-East theme, an interesting row occurred during Q/A time, when a person from the crowd took the occasion to attack Mr. Campbell directly over Syria, on a supposed exchange of secret e-mails and the fact that Bruce Kent, Britain's veteran peace campaigner for nuclear disarmament “wasn’t allowed to speak”; an attack the woman ended with a series of offensive “You’re a liar! You’re a liar!” to which Campbell replied an angry “Oh that’s a load of crap!” before adding “What I cannot stand is people refusing to hear others and their point of view,” before moving on once the person, obviously not open to dialogue, was taken away.

The initial good-natured mood came back at the very end, Campbell and Tubridy speculating about the future of Europe and particularly Scotland. Considering the rise of UKIP and its number of seats in Parliament, Campbell reminded once again that “we shouldn’t be complacent at all”, for it could become very difficult after the elections. “Perception is everything” – the former Director of Communications, of all people, should know that – “so we must not forget [what happened in Ireland] so that it doesn’t happen again: keep close eyes on that.”

The Irish Diaries, 1994-2003

By Alastair Campbell

320 pp. The Lilliput Press. €16.99 

This article was written for this blog only.