Tony Blair

Tony Blair is a British politician who served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 1997 to 2007 and led the Labour Party for 13 years. He was the first Labour leader to win three consecutive general elections.

Anthony Charles Lynton Blair was born on May 6, 1953, in Edinburgh, Scotland. His father, Leo Blair, was a barrister and law lecturer, and his mother, Hazel, came from County Donegal in Ireland. The family lived briefly in Australia before settling in Durham, England.

He attended Fettes College in Edinburgh, then read law at St John's College, Oxford, where he played in a rock band called Ugly Rumours. He was called to the bar at Lincoln's Inn in 1976 and entered Parliament as the Member for Sedgefield in 1983.

Blair became Labour leader in 1994, rebranded the party as New Labour, and led it to a landslide victory in 1997. As Prime Minister he oversaw devolution to Scotland and Wales, the Good Friday Agreement in Northern Ireland, and Britain's military involvement in Kosovo, Afghanistan, and Iraq. After leaving office in 2007 he served as a Middle East envoy and founded the Tony Blair Institute for Global Change.

Their name Tony derives from the Roman family name Antonius, traditionally said to mean priceless or invaluable. Tony is widely used as a short form of Anthony in English-speaking countries.