Tony Blair arriving at 10 Downing Street following the Labour Party’s election victory in May 1997
David Gordon/Alamy
The modern party leadership are now ascendant over their parties and, when in office, their government. The party leader has been empowered within this leadership. Contemporary politics has helped ‘stretch’ party leaders and prime ministers away from other party and parliamentary colleagues (Foley 2000).
For much of his premiership, Tony Blair was considered by some to have become so powerful as to have become a ‘president’. Presidentialism is the notion that the British prime minister has outgrown the parliamentary system:
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