Quit Tony while you're just about ahead

TONY Blair has no-one else to blame but himself for the constant questioning over his future. He might have thought he could stop the speculation by saying 18 months' ago that h'd be off towards the end of Labour's third consecutive term in office, but all it has done has turned him into a lame duck.

As Margaret Thatcher knows, there's no gratitude in politics. When your colleagues gauge you've become a liability, they can't show you the door quick enough.

Blair's radio interview in Australia over the timing of his departure, in which the word `mistake' has been the subject of much speculation and counter-clarifocation, should come as no surprise. There's a growing muddle at the heart of this Government as ministers start distancing themsleves from the Prime Minister - and he drapes himself in the mantle of international statesman and jets off on to the other side of the world, leaving his party to mop up the mess of his policy of seeking secret loans from wealthy businessmen to bankroll Labour's election campaign, neatly getting around the legislation that he himself trumpeted as cleaning up the Tories' stable.

But time is running out, and it's only the enormous patience of Gordon Brown which is allowing Blair to remain in office. Once Gordon finally has enough - goodness only knows, he's got the patience of Job as the Prime Minister shows no sign of honouring the agreement on the transition of power which the two are said to have thrashed out in an Islington restaurant 12 long years ago - expect the blood letting to begin.

Instead of thinking about hanging on as long as possible - it's said he wants to sort out the NHS but he's had nine years to do that without much sign of success - Tony Blair should be thinking about an early end to his premiership.

He may survive an appalling set of council election results in May and struggle on to his party's conference in Manchester in September, but surely when Labour's rank-and-file gather in Bournemouth the following September, the age of Blairism will be but a memory. The Prime Minister's heyday is over - quit while you're just about ahead Tony, or prepare your party to be swamped by the new age of the Cameroons.