Blair: 'Venomous' Brown tried blackmail to shelve Turner reforms

The revelation - described in the final chapter, Endgame, of Blair's autobiography The Journey - centres on the ‘cash for peerages' scandal, with the Labour government accused of awarding peerages in return for private donations to the party. In his recount of the events of 15 March 2006, the day the story broke, Blair talks of a morning discussion with Brown prior to a 4pm trilateral meeting with the then pensions secretary John Hutton to discuss the Turner commissions proposals. "When Gordon came in [to the morning meeting], he was in a venomous mood," recalled Blair. "I can truthfu...