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David
Blunkett to return to the Cabinet in major reshuffle
By Melissa Kite and
Patrick Hennessy
(Filed: 01/05/2005)
David Blunkett, the former home secretary,
is poised to make a swift return to the Cabinet in a reshuffle already
being planned by Tony Blair to follow a Labour victory in Thursday's
general election.
The
Telegraph has learnt that the Prime Minister's proposed changes reflect
his determination to stamp his personal authority on his government as
he begins what he has pledged will be his final term in office.
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David Blunkett could soon be
returning to the Cabinet
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This
includes a powerful "enforcer" role at the Cabinet Office for Mr
Blunkett. He will be charged with driving through planned reforms of
the public services and playing a leading role in fighting next year's
referendum on the European Union's constitution.
Other
carefully planned moves, according to Mr Blair's closest confidants,
include promoting John Reid, the Health Secretary, to Foreign Secretary
in place of Jack Straw. Mr Straw is likely to be demoted but to remain
in the Cabinet.
Alan
Milburn, who returned to the political front line last year to head
Labour's election campaign, is likely to be rewarded with the post of
Trade and Industry Secretary, currently held by Patricia Hewitt.
However,
he is unlikely to see the job as ideal, since it could to lead to
renewed tensions with Gordon Brown, his long-time political foe. Mr
Blair has already publicly pledged that Mr Brown will carry on as
Chancellor given a Labour win.
Details of the
planned reshuffle - in which leading supporters of the Prime Minister
are given the top jobs - suggest that Mr Blair is confident of securing
a comfortable victory this week, despite his public warnings that
Labour could be defeated.
This newspaper
understands from key allies of the Prime Minister that Tessa Jowell,
the Culture Secretary, is Mr Blair's choice to replace Mr Reid at the
Department of Health.
Stephen Byers, who resigned
as Transport Secretary in 2002 after a string of scandals in his
department, is expecting to return to the government.
"The new Cabinet looks as if
it will be unremittingly New Labour," said a close colleague of the
Prime Minister.
Mr
Blair is understood to have been given room for manoeuvre by Geoff
Hoon, the Defence Secretary, who has indicated his wish to leave the
Government. His job is likely to be filled by Alistair Darling, the
Transport Secretary.
The planned changes will mean
that neither Mr Straw nor Mr Hoon, the two cabinet ministers who played
the key roles in the Iraq war, will remain in their jobs.
Charles
Clarke, the Home Secretary, and Ruth Kelly, the Education Secretary,
both of whom got their posts after Mr Blunkett resigned in December,
are expected to remain at their departments.
The
proposed changes - some of which could yet fall victim to Mr Blair's
habit of "bungling" reshuffles - appear to provide further evidence
that the Prime Minister sees his next big political battle as the EU
referendum expected next year. The key departmental roles in the
campaign for a "Yes" vote will be the Foreign Office and the Cabinet
Office, where Mr Blair plans to place two of his strongest political
supporters, Mr Reid and Mr Blunkett.
Mr Reid -
whose wife, Carine Adler, is Jewish - was an early member of Labour
Friends of Israel. He is seen within his party as a foreign policy
expert and recently gave an interview to the French newspaper, La
Tribune, on the National Health Service.
The
decision likely to provoke the strongest reaction, however, would be
the return of Mr Blunkett, less than five months after he resigned.
He
quit as Home Secretary after learning that an inquiry had found that he
had "fast-tracked" a visa application submitted by Leoncia Casalme, the
nanny employed by his former lover, Kimberly Quinn.
The former minister had denied the original allegations, made in The
Telegraph, that he had misused his position to speed up the
application.
He has made little secret of
his desire to return to the Cabinet.
Since
Mr Blunkett's resignation, Mr Blair has been criticised by the
Conservatives for allowing the former home secretary to carry on living
in his "grace-and-favour" central London home with rent met by the
taxpayer.
Next story:
Howard: I'll have let down the country if Blair wins
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