Behind the Black Door The Secret World of Whitehall


Behind the Black Door

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This is the secret world of Whitehall.

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Decisions taken here behind closed doors affect all our daily lives.

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In this three-part series, I'm telling the inside story

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of what goes on within the three great institutions at the very heart of government - the Cabinet Office,

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10 Downing Street and the private office network across Whitehall.

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Tonight, the remarkable house that's been the office

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and home of our prime ministers for nearly three centuries.

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Those who have worked here reveal what life is really like behind the world's most famous front door.

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'When I first went to Downing Street, I thought it

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'was a completely unsuitable place to run a government from.'

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'Number 10 has always been a bit of a snake pit.

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'I mean, I don't imagine it's ever run incredibly smoothly, with everybody loving each other.'

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It's a cross between a sort of stately home and a student union building.

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My first six months in Number 10 were the most miserable of my working career,

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and I would include in that working as a butcher in Sainsbury's.

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You must understand about working in Number 10. It's a total pantomime.

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Since 1735, a terraced house in Whitehall has been the residence

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of a remarkable succession of British prime ministers.

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# I like my town

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# With a little drop of poison

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# Nobody knows

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# They're lining up to go insane... #

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Last year, David Cameron became the 53rd prime minister to enter Number 10,

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where the staff were lined up for the traditional greeting ceremony.

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The first thing was the sort of incredible sense of honour and challenge.

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You're elated and you're exhausted, because you've had an incredibly tough campaign,

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and then you turn and go in through the door.

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And it was quite a strange feeling, but also incredibly welcoming,

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because this tradition of being

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clapped and cheered in by the officials,

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who have just clapped and cheered out the outgoing prime minister, makes you feel very welcome.

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And I remember sort of walking through there and at that moment thinking, you know,

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"Right, this really has happened."

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The only time TV cameras have filmed the clapping-in ceremony was with John Major nearly 20 years ago.

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Major was returning as prime minister to Number 10 having won an unexpected general election victory.

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Thank you very much indeed. I've only got one thing to say - it's nice to be back.

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APPLAUSE

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But five years later, it was a very different scene after

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Major had lost the general election to Tony Blair by a landslide.

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When the curtain falls, it's time to get off the stage, and that is what I...

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Whenever a prime minister's defeated, the staff in Number 10 share the grief.

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Tony Blair recalls how,

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when he came in in 1997, he was applauded into Downing Street

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by people who had tears pouring down their cheeks because they were sad about the departure of John Major.

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And Tony Blair said he felt a heel.

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Yes, I think he did. I think he was very nice to one of the secretaries.

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He went up to her and said, "What's the matter?"

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She said, "Well, we're very glad to see you, but we're so sorry to see poor Mr Major having gone."

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It's a very, I would say, traumatic time for Number 10,

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because we say goodbye to a departing prime minister

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that we have worked loyally for for quite a long time

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and we clap them out, and then we need to work very quickly.

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Usually you have less than an hour to get the building ready for a new prime minister's arrival.

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Once inside Number 10, new prime ministers are taken down the corridor to the Cabinet Room.

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There, they'll learn about their most frightening new duty.

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Every prime minister has to hand-write top-secret letters

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to the commanders of the Trident submarines that carry Britain's nuclear weapons.

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One of the most awesome responsibilities

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that a prime minister has is the instructions that have to be given

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if the British government has been destroyed

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and the nuclear submarines are at sea.

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What are the orders to the commander of the nuclear submarines

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where there is no decision-making left in the UK?

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Tony Blair went really rather quiet when he was briefed, which was understandable.

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He'd never been a minister before, you see,

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let alone indoctrinated into the nuclear world.

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And this time, it wasn't just the Cabinet Secretary, it was the new

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National Security Adviser who did the briefing for David Cameron.

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That's when you know you're Prime Minister.

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I don't think anything prepares you for that, when you have to sit down

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and write from beyond the grave to decide whether to launch the British nuclear force or not.

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For nearly three centuries, prime ministers have governed from Number 10.

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It's a deceptive building, because it is in fact two houses, not one,

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with a much bigger redbrick mansion at the back joined onto the house on Downing Street.

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Inside, it's like a TARDIS, with a long corridor connecting the two houses to make one Number 10.

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From this unlikely house of history, the world's largest empire was run and two world wars were won.

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But Number 10 itself had very shady origins.

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It was jerry-built by a rascally figure called Sir George Downing.

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He was a spy and double agent turned property speculator.

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The street he gave his name to once boasted pubs and whorehouses.

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Downing put up a cul-de-sac of shoddily built houses on boggy ground.

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In 1735, King George II gave Number 10 to his prime minister.

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Since then, the PM's workplace and home has undergone many facelifts.

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It's been adapted and partially reconstructed

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in an attempt to make it fit for the purpose that it wasn't built for.

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Number 10 is a very modest building, and if you compare it

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with the offices in which other heads of government work,

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like the White House or the Elysee Palace in France and so on, it is of course tiny,

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and that often impresses people, because it is so small.

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When I first went to Downing Street, I thought

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it was a completely unsuitable place to run a government from.

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It doesn't feel like a modern office.

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Because it was a house, it was intimate, and there weren't all

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that many people working there, and everybody felt part of the family.

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You really all felt as if you were in it together.

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But it's not always a game of happy families among the secretaries, messengers, switchboard operators,

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civil servants and political advisers who make up Number 10's extended family.

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On his first day in power, Tony Blair and his wife

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walked past the pictures of every previous prime minister to the state rooms on the first floor.

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The rooms are used for press conferences and parties,

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receiving foreign leaders and for official dinners.

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The Blairs had only been inside Number 10 once before,

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as they hadn't wanted to look as if they were taking things for granted.

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Above the state rooms, you come to the attic, which is where

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the prime minister lived,

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in a flat which these days I doubt many councils

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would offer to asylum seekers.

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Really very small and poky.

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And everything is fairly close at hand.

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That's the good thing in having a very, very small kitchen.

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And as you can see, we all have to be very, very economically spaced.

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Now, I think...

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The Number 10 flat in the attic is far from grand, and the Blairs, like some other

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previous prime ministerial couples, were not attracted by the idea of living there.

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We had to persuade Gordon Brown to give up the Number 11 flat and

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allow Tony and Cherie to live there, which he did with difficulty.

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I think that Gordon was very keen to preserve his space.

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I think he thought,

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like Germany in the 19th century, he was going to gradually take over everything

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and there'd be nothing left while we sought lebensraum in Number 11.

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Oh, I'm sorry for being late. Very nice to see you.

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The new chancellor welcomed a group of businessmen to 11 Downing Street.

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It's a very strange arrangement,

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because Tony Blair actually stays in Number 11 Downing Street.

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He's got a big flat upstairs.

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And I stay at Number 10 Downing Street, so we swap.

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There's an upstairs connecting door, is there?

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-There's lots of connecting doors!

-LAUGHTER

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We had a bit more difficulty when Leo was born, because we needed more space, because of course with yet

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another child, the Blairs needed another bedroom.

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And so we had to move them further along the corridor

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into Number 10, and we had to steal a room from Gordon.

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And Gordon was quite, sort of, grumpy about this and insisted on

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a letter saying he could have it back when Euan went to university.

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I thought that was rather nice, the concordat between the Number 11 flat and the Number 10 flat.

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Number 10's most historic room is where every cabinet has met since the 18th century.

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By tradition, the prime minister's chair is the only one with arms,

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and is left permanently half-out from the table.

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Some prime ministers totally dominate their cabinet,

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others seek consensus, and some seek to ignore it altogether.

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As there's no specific office set aside

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for the prime minister in Number 10, some prefer to work and receive visitors in the Cabinet Room itself.

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Ah, but that was part of the trick.

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If you sat in an overwhelming room with a table 25 feet long,

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just think what the poor man who never used it

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felt when he came in and sat opposite you!

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I won't say it was like Mussolini,

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who I'm told used to make you walk the whole length of his room,

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but it was quite an experience, obviously, for people to come into the Cabinet Room and sit there,

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even when the Cabinet wasn't there,

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in order to discuss things with the prime minister.

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Margaret Thatcher would use the first-floor study as her office.

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All modern prime ministers inherit two key parts of the Downing Street

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machine to help them run the Government in the way they choose.

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In pride of place is the Number 10 private office, that's staffed by a handful of young-ish civil servants.

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Their task is to reduce the pressures on the prime minister and make the job more manageable.

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These so-called private secretaries

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are high-fliers, mainly from the great Whitehall departments like the Foreign Office and the Treasury.

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The other main support for the prime minister is the press office.

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Its job is to try and manage the news from Number 10.

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The press secretary gives the official line

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to the political journalists at the twice-daily lobby briefings.

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-It continues to be difficult...

-And the press office is on round-the-clock call to the media.

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That's the point we're trying to make.

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Do we dispute the figures published in the Times?

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There's no written constitutional definition

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of the job of prime minister, and each new incumbent of Number 10 makes it up as they go along.

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One thing you've got to understand straight away about Number 10

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is that people think of it as a sort of modern office,

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absolute Rolls-Royce machinery at the centre of government.

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I mean, on a good day, it is a bit like that,

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but actually, it has this sort of informal style.

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It's a cross between a sort of stately home and a student union building.

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It's recreated in the image and style of each new incumbent

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to the office of prime minister.

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The first prime minister to live at Number 10 was the Old Etonian Whig Robert Walpole.

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Though he was only supposed to be the first among equals in

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his cabinet, he so dominated his colleagues that "prime minister"

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became a term of abuse, meaning someone too big for his boots.

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The Victorian titans, the Liberal Gladstone and the Tory Disraeli,

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were bitter political rivals.

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They continued the tradition of being by far the most formidable members of their government,

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and each accused the other of illegitimately using Number 10

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to build up his personal power base.

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Goodbye, Mr Chamberlain, and thanks for all you've tried to do.

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We welcome the new prime minister, Mr Churchill.

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In 1940, Winston Churchill took over Number 10 with the Nazis on the rampage across Europe.

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Churchill set up a coalition government with Labour, and he formed a streamlined

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war cabinet of fire to take swift military and political decisions.

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Downing Street was sandbagged against Nazi attacks.

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AIR RAID SIREN

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Churchill insisted on staying put in Number 10.

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He had the basement rooms specially strengthened against bomb attacks,

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and the staff were supplied with tin hats.

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And Churchill appointed his youthful private secretary to double up as Number 10's air raid warden.

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I was in the private secretary's room

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and in the mirror, I saw the most extraordinary apparition

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coming down the stairs.

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It was the rotund figure of the Prime Minister in his enormous quilted

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Chinese dressing gown with great red and golden dragons writhing around it.

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Slung over his shoulder was the regulation knapsack carrying the regulation gas mask

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and his tin hat on his head,

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trundling down the stairs.

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He came within sight of the mirror, and I saw him and he started.

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A broad grin spread over his face and he came and said, "John,

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"conditions of total war do produce some most remarkable spectacles."

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In the Blitz, Number 10 was a top target for Hitler's bombers.

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Although all the Number 10 windows were

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blown out by bombs landing nearby, the house didn't suffer a direct hit

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and these photos were kept secret by the wartime censors

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for fear of damaging public morale.

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When he could, Churchill went on working in Number 10,

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and it was from the Cabinet Room he made his famous wartime broadcasts.

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Today is Victory in Europe Day.

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Tomorrow will also be Victory in Europe Day.

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Advance Britannia!

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Long live the cause of freedom!

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But Churchill wasn't rewarded for victory, and left Number 10 by the back door

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after losing the 1945 election.

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A decade later, Anthony Eden and Clarissa, his new wife, who was

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Churchill's niece, had their wedding reception in the Number 10 garden.

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Eden succeeded Churchill,

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but he was forced to resign as a sick man after the debacle of Suez.

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Eden's wife said that she felt as if the Suez Canal

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had been flowing through her drawing room at Number 10.

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Eden's successor was another Tory Old Etonian, Harold Macmillan.

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He came to power with Number 10 in a state of turmoil.

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You'll understand me when I say that it's with a mixture of sorrow

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and pride that I speak to you as Prime Minister of Britain.

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Sorrow, because my friend and leader has had to lay down his burden

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because of grievous illness.

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Apart from that, it's a proud thing

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to be given the office of Prime Minister of Britain.

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He arrived to find the ship of state

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practically on the rocks.

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There was a fevered atmosphere of almost panic in Number 10,

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complete crisis.

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I believe he told the Queen he didn't think the government was going to last more than six weeks.

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And it wasn't just Macmillan's government that was precarious.

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Downing Street was in a very, very bad state, falling down in fact.

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There was considerable subsidence to the point that in the kitchen,

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the Office of Works had to come and put blocks under the legs at one end

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of the kitchen table so that Mrs Bell's rolling pin didn't roll off when she was making pastry!

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-Mrs Bell the cook?

-Mrs Bell the cook, yes.

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Inside Number 10, the cracks

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in the walls showed how the building was subsiding.

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Macmillan authorised extensive rebuilding works and set about trying to bring order to the

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Number 10 private office, which had itself been demoralised by Eden's increasingly splenetic behaviour.

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It was a different atmosphere because Harold Macmillan was extremely good

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at calming everybody down, because actually, it had been a very frenetic

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time and I think he thought we'd all got rather overworked up

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and he calmed us all down very well.

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That was a famous occasion when he put up on the door that quotation,

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"Quiet, calm deliberation disentangles every knot."

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To which my great friend John Wyndham added

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"And remember if it doesn't, you'll certainly be shot."

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John Wyndham was an old friend of Macmillan's

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and an ex-diplomat.

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Macmillan had brought Wyndham in to work as his political adviser in Number 10.

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It was a trend that would grow rapidly with later prime ministers.

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Labour's Harold Wilson formalised the position when he came to power in 1964.

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He set up a new political office to be run by his long-time private

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and political secretary, Marcia Williams.

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Her aim was to bolster Wilson politically and prevent him becoming

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a prisoner of the civil servants who ran Number 10.

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'In '64, there was a bad atmosphere.

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'The senior civil servants had been there 13 years and we were new.'

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It's a building where most of the senior people are men

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and in the main, they tend to be rather conservative.

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Unlike John Wyndham, Marcia Williams was an outsider, a grammar school girl

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who wasn't afraid to ruffle the mandarins' feathers.

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'Marcia Williams had a certain idea of the civil service, that a lot of them were closet Tories.'

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There was just one Marcia against a lot of them.

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It was her view that when she went in with him for the first time as

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prime minister in 1964, the civil servants tried to shut her out,

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tried to put her in a remote room.

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She said they wouldn't at first let her have official Number 10 writing paper.

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The civil service was so suspicious of political appointees

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that if they had to read anything classified or confidential,

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they had to stand up next to the desk

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of the Principal Private Secretary and read it there

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cos they couldn't be trusted to take it away. There was lots of resistance.

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Marcia Williams saw herself as Wilson's socialist conscience.

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She fought many pitched battles inside Number 10 against what she

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saw as the obstructionist and reactionary mandarins.

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But after six years, Wilson lost office.

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CHANTING

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When Ted Heath became prime minister in 1970, he was determined

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to run Number 10 in an entirely different way from Harold Wilson.

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I was given no brief of any kind

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but I'd deducted from things that Ted had said

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that one thing he wanted me to do was to make peace

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where there had been war.

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Number 10 had become a battlefield, a battlefield in the political office

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run by Marcia Williams, and the civil service.

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Sometimes Marcia won a bit and sometimes she'd be forced to retreat.

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I was clear that that had to come to an end.

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Ted Heath greatly admired the civil service that he'd once planned to join.

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He came increasingly to rely not on his cabinet ministers,

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but on the head of the civil service, Sir William Armstrong.

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The top mandarin was a shrewd operator and managed to bond with the usually prickly Prime Minister.

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William Armstrong became so influential that he was dubbed "the real Deputy Prime Minister".

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William and Ted hit it off in a big way.

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I could understand why ministers so loved William Armstrong

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as an adviser because he had a remarkably silky voice.

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He'd sit and chain-smoke, there would be wreaths of cigarette smoke

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going up, and this wonderfully soothing voice, and his fertile intelligence

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would always give the appearance, and I'm sure William believed it, that there was a way through.

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That it was going to be all right.

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But it was a rough time, and Heath soon ran into a range of economic and trade union problems.

0:22:010:22:06

Heath was forced into a humiliating series of U-turns.

0:22:100:22:15

Douglas Hurd, who was your political secretary,

0:22:150:22:18

noted in his diary at the time, "The government is

0:22:180:22:22

"wandering around the battlefield,

0:22:220:22:24

"looking for someone to surrender to and being massacred all the time."

0:22:240:22:29

Oh, well, that was silly.

0:22:290:22:31

Very silly.

0:22:310:22:32

I mean, the very language of it is silly.

0:22:350:22:37

How can a responsible person,

0:22:370:22:39

especially someone who was secretary to the prime minister,

0:22:390:22:42

produce stuff like that in his diary?

0:22:420:22:44

But the chain-smoking civil service chief William Armstrong

0:22:450:22:48

became seriously alarmed as inflation soared and the miners went on strike.

0:22:480:22:54

I think for William, the political and economic crisis of '73, '74

0:22:540:22:58

saw everything he'd grown up to believe in breaking up,

0:22:580:23:02

and as things got worse and worse, those who were at meetings with him

0:23:020:23:08

noticed the apocalyptic note getting ever louder in what William said,

0:23:080:23:12

that the country really was in the grip of forces

0:23:120:23:15

that might actually wreck it.

0:23:150:23:18

At Number 10, Robert Armstrong, who was Heath's Principal Private Secretary but no relation

0:23:190:23:24

to William, was growing increasingly concerned about the civil service chief's erratic behaviour.

0:23:240:23:30

William Armstrong came to talk to me and asked if we could

0:23:300:23:34

withdraw to another room where we weren't bugged.

0:23:340:23:38

And I don't know why he thought we might be bugged,

0:23:380:23:40

and took off his jacket and lay on the floor, and chain-smoked

0:23:400:23:46

and talked very wildly about the desperate state of the nation.

0:23:460:23:52

The next day, he apparently called

0:23:520:23:54

a meeting of all the permanent secretaries and said, "We must

0:23:540:23:58

"prepare for the end of the world

0:23:580:24:00

"and you must all retreat from Whitehall and go to the country."

0:24:000:24:04

And the Principal Private Secretary told him he phoned the Prime Minister, Ted Heath,

0:24:040:24:11

and said they'd had to lock up the head of the civil service,

0:24:110:24:15

and Ted Heath said in that very relaxed way of his,

0:24:150:24:19

"Oh, I thought he'd been behaving a bit oddly of late."

0:24:190:24:22

It was a very strange episode.

0:24:220:24:24

Heath called a snap election and lost.

0:24:260:24:28

He had to leave Number 10 after less than four years in office.

0:24:280:24:32

Well, I was bitterly disappointed. I wanted to continue, but it wasn't possible.

0:24:330:24:38

When Harold Wilson returned to Number 10, he was determined to build up his political power base.

0:24:400:24:45

He created a new policy unit to take on the official Whitehall machine.

0:24:450:24:50

It was an innovation that has lasted to the present day.

0:24:500:24:53

Harold Wilson said to me that having previously been prime minister for six years, one

0:24:550:25:00

of his main conclusions was that the prime minister,

0:25:000:25:04

who was in one sense the most powerful man in government,

0:25:040:25:07

was in another sense the weakest, because he didn't have a department backing him,

0:25:070:25:14

providing him with all the statistics and the information,

0:25:140:25:18

the ammunition for the Whitehall battles, and that's what he wanted.

0:25:180:25:23

Marcia Williams and Wilson's press secretary, Joe Haines, augmented

0:25:250:25:28

Donoughue as political advisers in the battle with Whitehall.

0:25:280:25:32

But they were to fall out among themselves over the role of Marcia Williams.

0:25:320:25:38

Harold Wilson would come down the back way to avoid going

0:25:380:25:41

past her office from his flat,

0:25:410:25:43

and come into my room and ask me to give him a drink.

0:25:430:25:47

He was safe in my room, you see, because she wasn't going to come crashing in there.

0:25:470:25:52

She never did.

0:25:520:25:53

Marcia clearly had a considerable hold over Harold Wilson,

0:25:530:25:58

who was afraid of her.

0:25:580:26:00

I was there once with him in the study in Number 10,

0:26:000:26:04

the phone rang and he obviously knew it was her.

0:26:040:26:07

He leapt to his feet and ran

0:26:070:26:11

across the room to the...bathroom

0:26:110:26:15

in the corner, and as he went in said, "Tell her I'm not here!"

0:26:150:26:21

She seemed to have some kind of power over him,

0:26:210:26:27

I don't really understand it.

0:26:270:26:29

I don't think they were sleeping together or anything like that.

0:26:290:26:32

I don't know what it was, but he didn't stand up to her.

0:26:320:26:35

My concern was it diminished his capacity to function fully as a prime minister.

0:26:370:26:44

Harold Wilson's personal doctor Joseph Stone

0:26:460:26:49

grew concerned about the effect Marcia Williams was having on the Prime Minister.

0:26:490:26:53

Joe Stone came into my room one day and said he was worried about the

0:26:550:26:58

stress that she was causing Harold

0:26:580:27:01

and something had to be done about it.

0:27:010:27:04

I said, "Joe, I've tried, he won't get rid of her, there's no way."

0:27:040:27:08

And Joe said, "I could dispose of her."

0:27:080:27:12

He said, "I'm her doctor, and I'd write the death certificate."

0:27:120:27:17

I remember Joe Stone said to me

0:27:190:27:21

it was in the national interest she be put down.

0:27:210:27:24

We both said no. Just imagine it.

0:27:260:27:29

Just imagine!

0:27:300:27:32

Press secretary kills...

0:27:320:27:34

Or press secretary in conspiracy to kill

0:27:340:27:39

Prime Minister's secretary.

0:27:390:27:40

"Murder in Number 10", I can write the headlines now.

0:27:400:27:44

So we said no.

0:27:440:27:46

After just two years back at Number 10, Wilson suddenly made way for an older man.

0:27:460:27:52

Having held the other three great offices, Jim Callaghan had,

0:27:520:27:56

in Disraeli's phrase, climbed to the top of the greasy pole.

0:27:560:28:01

'When you have become prime minister, you went in for the first time,

0:28:010:28:05

'I must tell you there's no other feeling in the world like it.

0:28:050:28:11

'I stood by the chair in the centre of the Cabinet table.'

0:28:110:28:15

Without being too pi about it, it was almost a religious sensation

0:28:150:28:18

for a moment.

0:28:180:28:20

Callaghan said he saw himself as Moses,

0:28:200:28:23

chosen to lead his people from the wilderness to the promised land.

0:28:230:28:27

Chancellor Denis Healey said Britain was facing bankruptcy

0:28:270:28:31

and needed to apply to the IMF for a huge loan.

0:28:310:28:35

But the Cabinet was bitterly divided between left and right, about the terms of the loan.

0:28:350:28:41

Callaghan then provided a textbook example of how to manage a split cabinet,

0:28:420:28:46

by holding seven day and night Cabinet meetings over a fortnight.

0:28:460:28:52

I decided to have a serious of Cabinet meetings and allow every member to be cross-examined

0:28:520:28:58

by his colleagues so they could see them what was the strength or weakness of his proposals.

0:28:580:29:03

I went through all that exercise and, at the end, I had a united cabinet.

0:29:030:29:07

But the Prime Minister's triumph was short-lived.

0:29:090:29:12

He came up against the power of the trade unions.

0:29:120:29:16

They launched a devastating series of public sector strikes in what

0:29:160:29:21

was to become known as the Winter Of Discontent.

0:29:210:29:24

The Winter of Discontent was a most depressing time in Number 10.

0:29:280:29:34

The government became quite impotent, the Prime Minister felt impotent

0:29:340:29:40

and we sat in Number 10 unable to do anything.

0:29:400:29:44

The Prime Minister was sitting in his study on his own

0:29:440:29:48

with few visitors. It felt like being on an Atlantic liner

0:29:480:29:53

where all of the engines had stopped.

0:29:530:29:57

Number 10 in those days was often cathedrally calm

0:29:570:30:03

and it now had the calm of the morgue.

0:30:030:30:06

When the first woman prime minister came to power in '79,

0:30:110:30:14

she quickly decided that Number 10 needed a serious facelift.

0:30:140:30:19

When Margaret Thatcher first came to Number 10,

0:30:190:30:22

she was pretty disappointed with the state of it.

0:30:220:30:24

She thought it basically looked like a furnished house to let,

0:30:240:30:27

with pretty inadequate furniture,

0:30:270:30:29

and the area outside the Cabinet Room she compared to a down-at-heel Pall Mall club.

0:30:290:30:35

She did go to considerable lengths to smarten it up.

0:30:350:30:39

-THATCHER:

-I don't think anyone had quite looked at it as a whole

0:30:390:30:44

or been quite interested enough in Downing Street as a house.

0:30:440:30:50

I got more strength into the whole place.

0:30:520:30:55

She had symbolic portraits installed.

0:30:590:31:03

This one, I think, of Wellington, is excellent.

0:31:030:31:06

You can see the determination.

0:31:060:31:08

You can see the Iron Duke.

0:31:080:31:11

Nelson, again, this expression in the eyes they've got.

0:31:110:31:16

We were absolutely right to have these two great heroes

0:31:160:31:21

of British history.

0:31:210:31:23

People who fought AND WON crucial battles,

0:31:230:31:27

and they fit beautifully into that space.

0:31:270:31:31

Mrs Thatcher had arrived in Number 10 with a profound suspicion of the civil service but, ironically,

0:31:310:31:38

two individual civil servants were to become her most influential and trusted advisers.

0:31:380:31:43

One was the private secretary who advised her on foreign affairs, Charles Powell.

0:31:430:31:49

POWELL: Margaret Thatcher had an enormously informal way of working with her private office staff.

0:31:490:31:54

It came through in many ways. She would argue with us as though she was arguing with a cabinet minister

0:31:540:32:00

and she had a disturbing habit of wandering into the private office to find out what one was doing.

0:32:000:32:05

On one occasion, she came down and sat on my desk and then answered my telephone.

0:32:050:32:10

She said, "What do you want?"

0:32:100:32:12

And the unfortunate voice said, "I was hoping to speak to Charles Powell."

0:32:120:32:17

"Well, you can't. He's much too busy." Bang!

0:32:170:32:20

The other civil servant who became Margaret Thatcher's most powerful adviser

0:32:200:32:24

was her press secretary, Bernard Ingham.

0:32:240:32:27

He was an abrasive Yorkshireman who was to become known as Margaret Thatcher's Rottweiler.

0:32:270:32:34

Were you temperamentally suited for

0:32:340:32:36

-the role of Number 10 press secretary?

-I don't know.

0:32:360:32:39

I think there is at least an argument to say that somebody with

0:32:390:32:42

my fiery temper and forthright views and determination

0:32:420:32:47

perhaps should never have come anywhere near Number 10

0:32:470:32:50

except, of course, to serve Mrs Thatcher.

0:32:500:32:52

Why "except, of course, to serve Mrs Thatcher?"

0:32:520:32:55

Well, because of those qualities,

0:32:550:32:57

I think I could quite adequately represent her attitude too.

0:32:570:33:02

Margaret Thatcher's use of her Cabinet could scarcely have been more different from Jim Callaghan's.

0:33:040:33:09

In opposition she'd said that once in Number 10 she wouldn't waste time on internal arguments.

0:33:090:33:16

Margaret Thatcher's style was to announce the conclusions

0:33:160:33:19

of the meeting and then challenge all-comers to fight her.

0:33:190:33:22

Mrs Thatcher was not a collegiate prime minister. She would...

0:33:220:33:26

come close to summing up before the meeting took place.

0:33:260:33:29

-How did you find that?

-Well, you got used to it

0:33:290:33:33

-and you knew the techniques by which you had to survive.

-Which were what?

0:33:330:33:38

Well, you didn't give in and you insisted on getting your words out

0:33:380:33:43

no matter how often you were interrupted and you just kept going.

0:33:430:33:46

I think sometimes a prime minister SHOULD be intimidating.

0:33:460:33:50

There's not much point being a weak, floppy thing in the chair, is there?

0:33:500:33:54

But the two blonde bombshells were to fall out dramatically.

0:33:560:34:00

At one cabinet meeting, Heseltine suddenly stood up and walked out.

0:34:000:34:04

It would be wrong for me to say anything at this instant.

0:34:040:34:08

I have resigned from the Cabinet and I will make a full statement later today.

0:34:080:34:12

'Of course it was portrayed as storming out.'

0:34:130:34:17

I have never stormed out of anything in my life.

0:34:170:34:20

I am a pancake. I do not get roused.

0:34:200:34:22

Hezza was the first minister to walk out of the Cabinet in 100 years,

0:34:220:34:28

claiming Mrs Thatcher had rigged the agenda.

0:34:280:34:32

What I will not tolerate is people who cheat.

0:34:320:34:35

Did you think Mrs Thatcher was cheating?

0:34:350:34:37

She did, no question about that.

0:34:370:34:39

-Were you in the Cabinet when Michael Heseltine walked out?

-Yes.

0:34:390:34:42

-What did you think?

-I thought...

0:34:420:34:44

Well, I wasn't surprised. Michael Heseltine is

0:34:440:34:50

a man given to high drama and clearly he had run out of road space.

0:34:500:34:56

ANNOUNCEMENT: The Prime Minister and Mr Thatcher.

0:34:580:35:01

After 11 years at Number 10, Margaret Thatcher had grown increasingly regal.

0:35:010:35:06

She was accused of being out of touch and seeking to run a government within a government.

0:35:060:35:12

Leading members of her cabinet gradually turned against her.

0:35:120:35:17

She had become more dependent on people in whom she had confidence

0:35:170:35:21

and particularly in Bernard Ingham and Charles Powell,

0:35:210:35:25

to the extent which they had usurped the position of

0:35:250:35:30

some of the Secretaries of State,

0:35:300:35:33

and this was a weakness, I think, in the end.

0:35:330:35:36

It was an important part of Margaret Thatcher's demise.

0:35:360:35:39

Challenged in a leadership election, Mrs Thatcher failed to win outright on the first ballot.

0:35:410:35:48

JOURNALIST: Mrs Thatcher, when are you going to resign?

0:35:480:35:51

Most of her cabinet ministers advised Mrs Thatcher that she should step down.

0:35:510:35:56

After a long, dark night of the soul in Number 10,

0:35:560:36:00

the Iron Lady reluctantly decided the game was up.

0:36:000:36:04

11 years after the first woman prime minister

0:36:060:36:09

had been clapped in to Number 10...

0:36:090:36:11

..she was clapped out.

0:36:120:36:15

HEATH: I expected it to happen sooner or later.

0:36:180:36:21

I thought then there would be a chance of getting sensible policies.

0:36:210:36:26

But they didn't change very much.

0:36:260:36:28

It was said that you rang your office and said, "Rejoice, rejoice!"

0:36:280:36:35

I said it three times, I think.

0:36:350:36:37

"Rejoice, rejoice, rejoice!"

0:36:370:36:39

Heartbreak.

0:36:410:36:43

Of course it was.

0:36:430:36:45

It was a terrible thing.

0:36:450:36:47

History keeps on writing it up and it was an awful thing.

0:36:470:36:51

Bad men voting for bad principles.

0:36:510:36:56

If you are in politics you expect there will be knives in the back.

0:36:560:36:59

What I will never forgive is,

0:36:590:37:01

it wasn't by Parliament that I was thrown out.

0:37:010:37:05

And this was after nearly 11 years

0:37:050:37:08

when I had taken Britain from the slough of despond to the heights.

0:37:080:37:15

I shall never forget that and I shall never forgive.

0:37:150:37:19

One of the Iron Lady's tangible legacies to Downing Street

0:37:200:37:24

were the new security gates.

0:37:240:37:26

With no access for the public, the risk of a prime minister developing a bunker mentality was increased

0:37:260:37:31

and the gates would fail to protect the building itself.

0:37:310:37:37

In 1991, Mrs Thatcher's successor John Major held a meeting of his newly formed war Cabinet.

0:37:370:37:43

It was the start of the first Gulf war against Saddam Hussein

0:37:430:37:47

and the cabinet was discussing the threat of Iraqi terrorist attacks in London.

0:37:470:37:53

BUTLER: The most extraordinary thing which I recall clearly was

0:37:530:37:57

that John Major had just used the word "bombs".

0:37:570:37:59

EXPLOSION

0:38:010:38:04

And there was this tremendous explosion.

0:38:040:38:07

Go back up the street. It is not safe.

0:38:070:38:09

Two mortar bombs had been fired at Number 10

0:38:110:38:13

by the Provisional IRA from a white van in Whitehall.

0:38:130:38:18

Keep away from these windows!

0:38:180:38:20

The windows all shook, the French windows at the end of the cabinet room burst open

0:38:200:38:27

and, perhaps because of the context we were talking about,

0:38:270:38:30

my first reaction was that this was a terrorist attack

0:38:300:38:34

where people had come over the wall of Number 10,

0:38:340:38:37

blown open the cabinet doors, the French windows,

0:38:370:38:41

and we were all going to be sprayed with gunfire.

0:38:410:38:44

I dived under the table, and so did some of the others.

0:38:440:38:50

I was sitting next to John Major and my first reaction

0:38:500:38:52

was to put my hand on his head and push him down under the table.

0:38:520:38:55

We got down under the table and there was a tremendous aftershock.

0:38:550:38:58

We could hear the windows being blown in and then

0:38:580:39:01

the sound of what seemed very much like a second mortar.

0:39:010:39:04

EXPLOSION Nobody knew what to do.

0:39:040:39:08

What do Englishmen do when they are being mortared in their Cabinet Room?

0:39:080:39:12

It wasn't entirely clear.

0:39:120:39:14

I looked around and there was the Cabinet Secretary

0:39:140:39:16

and the rest of the Cabinet crouching under the table.

0:39:160:39:20

The next thing that happened, perhaps the most dangerous phase, was the Cabinet Room door burst open

0:39:200:39:25

and the number of middle-aged, rather overweight policemen

0:39:250:39:28

came rushing in waving 1948 Webley revolvers.

0:39:280:39:31

This was getting really serious.

0:39:310:39:33

I don't think they had ever been fired, and I don't even know if they knew how to fire them.

0:39:330:39:38

It could have been a disaster.

0:39:380:39:40

We waited there a moment until the aftershock went away.

0:39:400:39:43

We got up, asked for people to go and check and see what damage was done

0:39:430:39:47

and I then said, "Well, I think we had better go and start somewhere else."

0:39:470:39:51

The War Cabinet reconvened in a secure area.

0:39:520:39:55

There had been no serious casualties from the mortar attack.

0:39:550:40:00

After winning the 1992 election, Major's last years in office

0:40:000:40:05

were plagued by cabinet splits over Europe.

0:40:050:40:07

He explained why he didn't sack trouble-making Euro-sceptic ministers,

0:40:070:40:11

when he talked candidly after a TV interview in Number 10

0:40:110:40:15

without realising he was still being recorded.

0:40:150:40:18

Where do you think most of this poison has come from?

0:40:180:40:21

The dispossessed and the never possessed.

0:40:210:40:23

You and I can both think of ex-ministers who are going around causing all sorts of trouble.

0:40:230:40:28

Would you like three more of the bastards out there?

0:40:280:40:30

When New Labour came to power, Tony Blair and his top two political advisers,

0:40:300:40:35

Alastair Campbell and Jonathan Powell, planned to run Number 10 in a new way.

0:40:350:40:40

Powell said they wanted a Napoleonic system with greatly increased control

0:40:400:40:45

over civil servants and ministers exercised from the centre.

0:40:450:40:49

POWELL: In terms of the jobs at Number 10, I had a fairly clear idea before we went in.

0:40:490:40:53

In particular, I felt from looking at what had happened under John Major

0:40:530:40:57

or under Mrs Thatcher,

0:40:570:40:59

there was a lack of a Chief of Staff,

0:40:590:41:00

there was no-one who brought everything together.

0:41:000:41:03

You had the political side competing with the Civil Service side,

0:41:030:41:06

the foreign policy side competing with the domestic side.

0:41:060:41:09

The press side competing with the policy side.

0:41:090:41:11

No-one under the Prime Minister was answerable for the whole lot.

0:41:110:41:14

So, in my view, you had to have someone who could reconcile those differences

0:41:140:41:18

before the Prime Minister had to be dragged in.

0:41:180:41:21

We created the job of a Chief of Staff who was part civil service and part political.

0:41:210:41:27

Tony Blair didn't believe the Cabinet was the right body to take big decisions.

0:41:270:41:31

He preferred working informally with his trusted advisers from the sofa in his office.

0:41:310:41:37

-BUTLER:

-It clearly came as quite a new idea to Tony Blair

0:41:370:41:41

that big decisions of government

0:41:410:41:43

should be collective decisions of the Cabinet,

0:41:430:41:47

and I don't think he ever really, during my time, acclimatised to that.

0:41:470:41:52

Determined to dominate the news agenda,

0:41:520:41:55

Blair gave unprecedented power to his spin doctor Alastair Campbell, the former tabloid journalist.

0:41:550:42:01

Do you often come to your press secretary's office?

0:42:010:42:05

I do if I'm passing, which I happen to be.

0:42:050:42:08

-How important is your press secretary to you?

-Not at all.

0:42:080:42:12

What?

0:42:120:42:14

How important is Alastair Campbell to you?

0:42:140:42:18

A press secretary is important for the Prime Minister.

0:42:180:42:21

It would be odd if he wasn't.

0:42:210:42:23

Everyone says the importance you put on relations with the media

0:42:230:42:26

is greater than it has ever been in the past.

0:42:260:42:29

It is just modern government.

0:42:290:42:30

It is a 24-hour-a-day news media.

0:42:300:42:33

It is not as if these stories don't take a life of their own

0:42:330:42:36

and start running away into the far distance and the publics thinks,

0:42:360:42:40

"What are they doing that for?" when you are not doing it at all.

0:42:400:42:44

It is important to have the capacity to get on top of the news as far as possible.

0:42:440:42:49

What is important for me is that it doesn't disturb me from doing the things that are really important.

0:42:490:42:54

Which are, you know, the things for the country,

0:42:540:42:58

otherwise there is no point doing this job.

0:42:580:43:01

People can believe that or not but that is what I spend my time thinking of.

0:43:010:43:05

It's why you just spent seven minutes talking to Michael Cockerell.

0:43:050:43:09

LAUGHTER

0:43:090:43:11

Alongside Campbell and Jonathan Powell, who is the brother of Charles Powell,

0:43:130:43:18

Blair had brought in a slew of other special advisers to Number 10.

0:43:180:43:22

My impression on my rare visits to Number 10 in Tony Blair's time

0:43:220:43:27

was that it had become a bit of a slum.

0:43:270:43:29

There were so many people working or hanging around Number 10

0:43:290:43:33

it was almost like a railway station, so many people coming and going.

0:43:330:43:37

For me it had rather lost the elegance and the calm

0:43:370:43:42

which, for me, characterised Number 10.

0:43:420:43:44

Now it was a sort of scurrying exchange.

0:43:440:43:49

People rushing to and fro in jeans. It just seemed to be different.

0:43:490:43:53

Working at Number 10, Matthew Taylor, the former policy wonk,

0:43:550:43:58

was Blair's Director of Political Strategy.

0:43:580:44:01

I used to go running most days so I would often be found

0:44:030:44:06

wandering around Number 10 in my shorts and running shirt.

0:44:060:44:09

So Tony, as we know, is quite informal in the way in which he did things.

0:44:090:44:15

We talked to your brother Charles, and his sense of Number 10 under you.

0:44:260:44:32

He said Number 10 became like a slum, like a railway station

0:44:320:44:35

with people wandering around in jeans.

0:44:350:44:38

He's thinking of me, I think, in my bicycling gear.

0:44:380:44:41

He always disapproved of the way I dressed.

0:44:410:44:44

When the Prime Minister is away, Number 10 becomes eerily quiet.

0:44:450:44:49

But an infamous day a decade ago

0:44:490:44:51

vividly illustrated how Downing Street coped with a calamity.

0:44:510:44:56

On 9/11 itself Tony had gone down to Brighton to give a speech to the TUC

0:44:560:45:00

and I'd stayed behind in Number 10 Downing Street

0:45:000:45:03

expecting a nice, quiet day.

0:45:030:45:05

I was using Tony's office, we had gone into to the den

0:45:050:45:07

and we were meeting in there as the first plane hit the tower.

0:45:070:45:10

The duty clerk put his head around the door and said "another plane's gone into the World Trade Center",

0:45:100:45:14

and I said, "Don't be silly, it's repeating the film again." He said, "No, no, it's another one."

0:45:140:45:18

Immediately we tried to grab control of what was happening.

0:45:180:45:21

It was lunchtime, so the mandarins were all out at lunch.

0:45:210:45:23

I was coming back from lunch

0:45:230:45:26

and my driver said as I got in the car,

0:45:260:45:28

"Someone's driven a plane into the World Trade Center."

0:45:280:45:32

I said, I thought, "This is probably an amateur."

0:45:320:45:35

And...I turned on the radio.

0:45:350:45:38

As we drove back we heard a second plane had gone into the tower.

0:45:380:45:44

I said, "Oh, this sounds more serious."

0:45:440:45:48

And Jeremy Hayward, the Prime Minister's private secretary, who was still in Number 10,

0:45:480:45:53

rang me up and said, "We think the White House may be going to evacuate,

0:45:530:45:57

"should we be evacuating Number 10?"

0:45:570:45:59

I said, "Where would you go to?"

0:45:590:46:01

Jeremy said, "I'm not sure."

0:46:010:46:04

I said, "Well, I think it's quite a good rule not to evacuate until you know where you're going to go to."

0:46:040:46:10

I had this image of all the staff of Number 10 standing on the pavement,

0:46:100:46:14

with their laptops, cellphones and briefcases,

0:46:140:46:17

and I thought what a good photograph it would be in the paper the next day. So we stayed put.

0:46:170:46:22

Nice and calmly out the front, ladies and gents.

0:46:220:46:24

As the media were evacuated from Downing Street, the officials left behind

0:46:240:46:29

considered what information they had about those behind 9/11.

0:46:290:46:33

In the immediate aftermath it occurred to me how little we knew about the Taliban.

0:46:330:46:37

9/11 had happened and we hadn't really had the Taliban on our radar screen at all.

0:46:370:46:41

I walked down Whitehall to the Waterstones on Trafalgar Square

0:46:410:46:45

and bought a copy of all the books I could find on the Taleban.

0:46:450:46:47

The only one that was any use was one by Ahmed Rashid,

0:46:470:46:50

which is a very good book about the Taliban and the fights with the warlords.

0:46:500:46:54

I sat at my desk and read this for the next 12 hours.

0:46:540:46:58

I read the whole book. Alastair and Tony became jealous

0:46:580:47:01

and wanted to have my copy and had to wait.

0:47:010:47:03

Alastair got to read it first and Tony after that.

0:47:030:47:06

Then we were the experts on the Taliban.

0:47:060:47:08

But it's not chapter seven...

0:47:080:47:09

Jonathan Powell and Alastair Campbell became the most powerful unelected figures in the government.

0:47:090:47:14

They were members of Tony Blair's war cabinet on Afghanistan as well as Iraq.

0:47:140:47:20

The wars were to weaken Blair and hasten his departure from Number 10.

0:47:200:47:26

Also in the war cabinet was the Chancellor, Gordon Brown,

0:47:260:47:29

who'd long felt that he should take over Tony Blair's job.

0:47:290:47:35

The only time I noticed him cheering up was when the war cabinet

0:47:350:47:38

was briefed on a death threat to Tony and a smile crossed his face.

0:47:380:47:41

I thought that was very amusing.

0:47:410:47:43

After a decade, Tony Blair left Number 10 with his family.

0:47:440:47:48

It now included their young son Leo, who had been born during the Blair premiership.

0:47:480:47:53

What the 24-hour media called the Blair soap opera was at an end.

0:47:530:47:57

Goodbye!

0:47:570:47:59

I don't think we'll miss you.

0:47:590:48:01

The previous week, Blair had been asked whether the fact he was going had sunk in.

0:48:060:48:11

Er, yeah, no... I definitely don't have a problem with it.

0:48:110:48:15

I've prepared for this for a long time.

0:48:150:48:18

I've no problem at all. I know everyone thinks I should be...

0:48:180:48:21

sort of...

0:48:210:48:25

you know, in a state of denial about it, but I'm absolutely fine.

0:48:250:48:30

-BROWN:

-This will be a new government with new priorities,

0:48:320:48:35

in the service of what matters to the British people.

0:48:350:48:39

And now let the work of change begin. Thank you.

0:48:390:48:44

MANDELSON: Gordon didn't have an absolutely clear idea from the beginning

0:48:440:48:48

how Number 10 could and should operate under his premiership.

0:48:480:48:51

I think he came to Number 10 with a clear sense of

0:48:510:48:54

it not being Blair's Number 10,

0:48:540:48:55

so he would overcome sofa government, so-called,

0:48:550:48:58

he would deprive political advisers of powers to instruct civil servants

0:48:580:49:03

and he would have a different set-up on the spin agenda.

0:49:030:49:07

It was very defined in antithesis to Blair.

0:49:070:49:11

A visit to the Mayor of New York's office

0:49:110:49:14

inspired Gordon Brown with an idea for how he should run Number 10.

0:49:140:49:18

Mayor Michael Bloomberg was a former financial trader turned media mogul

0:49:180:49:23

and Brown was impressed with the Mayor's open-plan office.

0:49:230:49:27

It was a mix of trading floor and newsroom with giant TV screens.

0:49:290:49:34

Brown brought the Mayor's concept back with him across the Atlantic.

0:49:350:49:39

He had his own office and senior staff

0:49:390:49:41

moved along the linking corridor from Number 10 to Number 12.

0:49:410:49:44

How you doing there? OK?

0:49:440:49:46

And created what he called the War Room.

0:49:460:49:48

Gordon put himself and his immediate and top civil servants

0:49:480:49:53

and political advisers and speech writers

0:49:530:49:56

all around a bank of computers and workstations with large screens,

0:49:560:50:03

you know, BBC over there and Sky behind you.

0:50:030:50:07

He was in the middle, a bit like Mission Control. He was the pilot.

0:50:070:50:14

Just cast your mind back to Number 10 under Harold Macmillan

0:50:140:50:18

and fast forward to Gordon Brown, you know,

0:50:180:50:21

in the War Room with the televisions, you know,

0:50:210:50:24

and everyone at their desks and computers with the commander in the field,

0:50:240:50:29

as the Prime Minister saw himself, you know, driving everyone,

0:50:290:50:32

responding to things very quickly

0:50:320:50:35

and taking thoughts from the television and sending his orders out.

0:50:350:50:40

Gordon would often look up at the screen and see who was saying what.

0:50:400:50:44

If he didn't like it, he would let you know.

0:50:440:50:46

Would he shout at the screen and say, "That's wrong"?

0:50:460:50:49

Oh, sometimes if he saw somebody saying something

0:50:490:50:52

on the telly that he didn't agree with or felt was inaccurate,

0:50:520:50:55

then he would let the television know.

0:50:550:50:57

I thought it must have been bedlam,

0:50:570:50:59

but the open plan was the way in which he thought

0:50:590:51:02

it was most effective to work.

0:51:020:51:04

Working with Brown in the War Room and trying to dominate

0:51:050:51:08

the round-the-clock news media was Damian McBride.

0:51:080:51:12

A former Treasury official, McBride had been hand-picked by Brown

0:51:120:51:16

for his aggressive mastery of the black arts of spin.

0:51:160:51:19

He was quickly dubbed "the Prime Minister's attack dog".

0:51:190:51:22

But McBride's emails proposing a sexual smear campaign

0:51:220:51:26

against leading Tory politicians and their wives were leaked.

0:51:260:51:30

Brown at first refused to say "sorry"

0:51:300:51:33

for McBride's actions.

0:51:330:51:35

Prime Minister, will you apologise for Damian McBride's emails?

0:51:350:51:39

Until he felt he had no alternative.

0:51:390:51:41

When I saw this first, I was horrified, I was shocked and I was very angry indeed.

0:51:410:51:47

The person who was responsible went immediately, and lost his job.

0:51:470:51:52

-MANDELSON:

-Gordon never entirely succeeded in having

0:51:540:51:57

the right people in the right positions

0:51:570:52:01

with the right links and relationships

0:52:010:52:04

working in the absolutely right way.

0:52:040:52:08

MATTINSON: The atmosphere in Number 10 got worse and worse.

0:52:080:52:13

You know, people were incredibly unhappy.

0:52:130:52:16

Gordon had been at his best when he was positioning himself

0:52:180:52:22

-against a clear enemy...

-Tony Blair?

-Be it his neighbour in Number 10,

0:52:220:52:27

be it poverty, he was at his best

0:52:270:52:31

when he was positioning himself against something.

0:52:310:52:34

When suddenly the stage was his, and he had to say what he was FOR,

0:52:340:52:39

he found that much more difficult.

0:52:390:52:41

Brown became increasingly indecisive in Number 10.

0:52:410:52:45

According to one of his civil servants,

0:52:450:52:47

he never once finished a Red Box,

0:52:470:52:49

and big issues would pile up as Brown spent his time on micro-management.

0:52:490:52:54

TAYLOR: Gordon Brown's management at Number 10 struck me as being pretty tense.

0:52:540:52:58

If the Prime Minister tries to get into the depth of every single issue,

0:52:580:53:02

it's a recipe for overload and madness.

0:53:020:53:05

Are you going to resign, Mr Brown?

0:53:050:53:07

You've lost, haven't you?

0:53:100:53:12

Two days after last May's general election

0:53:120:53:15

that put Labour behind the Tories in a hung parliament,

0:53:150:53:17

Brown was still seeking a deal that would enable him to stay in Number 10.

0:53:170:53:23

I went into Number 10 on the Saturday to talk about

0:53:250:53:28

what the prospects might be for a Labour/Liberal Democrat coalition

0:53:280:53:31

but the weird feeling was that Number 10 was no longer the source of power.

0:53:310:53:35

This place, which is at the heart of the British state, where power is supposed to reside.

0:53:350:53:40

It was clear to me that power was not in the building.

0:53:400:53:43

Brown stayed put in Number 10 for four days after the election,

0:53:430:53:48

still hoping to construct a last-minute deal,

0:53:480:53:51

when his chief negotiator, Peter Mandelson, came in.

0:53:510:53:54

Gordon was on phone to Nick Clegg and I listened in, perfectly clear

0:53:540:54:00

that Nick Clegg and David Cameron were going to form a coalition.

0:54:000:54:04

They needed to get on with it.

0:54:040:54:05

I said after the phone call had ended, "Gordon, this is it.

0:54:050:54:10

"You shouldn't really be hanging around.

0:54:100:54:13

"You certainly shouldn't be hanging around waiting interminably for these two guys to make up their mind

0:54:130:54:19

"with the result that you might end up leaving Number 10 at nine or 10 o'clock at night. In the dark."

0:54:190:54:26

You know, "Is that the way we want people to see you,

0:54:260:54:28

the Labour prime minister leaving Downing Street

0:54:280:54:31

"after 13 years in office, in the dark?"

0:54:310:54:34

I didn't like that at all.

0:54:340:54:35

My resignation as leader of the Labour Party will take effect immediately,

0:54:350:54:39

and as I leave the second most important job I could ever hold,

0:54:390:54:43

I cherish even more the first, as a husband and father.

0:54:430:54:49

Thank you. And goodbye.

0:54:490:54:52

CAMERON: On the steps of Downing Street yesterday evening,

0:54:540:54:57

I said that Nick and I wanted to put aside party differences

0:54:570:55:02

and work together in the national interest.

0:55:020:55:05

Cameron says that when he arrived in Number 10, Brown had left him

0:55:050:55:09

a good-luck present of a bottle of whisky, but no revolver.

0:55:090:55:14

CHATTER

0:55:140:55:16

Cameron was determined to run Number 10 very differently from Blair and Brown.

0:55:160:55:22

This is the first coalition government for 65 years.

0:55:220:55:26

I think it's a great achievement to have put it together.

0:55:260:55:29

We have a great opportunity, I think, for the long term

0:55:290:55:32

because we have the chance of a five-year government

0:55:320:55:35

where we can really grapple with the problems the country faces.

0:55:350:55:39

The oldest member of the coalition cabinet has served in every Tory government from Ted Heath's on.

0:55:390:55:45

-CLARKE:

-David Cameron's returned to collective government.

0:55:450:55:48

It was practically dead as a dodo,

0:55:480:55:50

listening to the ex-senior civil servants under Blair and Brown.

0:55:500:55:55

They just had a little group in their study,

0:55:550:55:57

where the only people who knew what was going on really decided anything.

0:55:570:56:01

We had gone back to having a proper Cabinet system,

0:56:010:56:04

a proper Cabinet committee system which I am used to.

0:56:040:56:07

Every Tuesday there's a Cabinet. It used to start at nine.

0:56:070:56:10

With the change of Prime Ministers we now start at 9:45

0:56:100:56:14

because the Prime Minister and Deputy are taking their children to school first.

0:56:140:56:18

That's a change from the past.

0:56:180:56:19

Cameron said that transparency and openness were the coalition's watchwords.

0:56:190:56:25

He was cutting back sharply on the number of unelected political advisers.

0:56:250:56:29

One side, please.

0:56:300:56:32

Move to one side, please.

0:56:320:56:34

But the Number 10 minders hadn't exactly embraced the new glasnost.

0:56:340:56:38

Move to one side, please.

0:56:380:56:40

And David Cameron's top two special advisers in Number 10

0:56:400:56:44

sought determinedly to stay out of the limelight.

0:56:440:56:47

One is the camera-shy Steve Hilton,

0:56:490:56:52

a rebranding expert who invented the Big Society.

0:56:520:56:56

He's brought his casual dress sense to Number 10,

0:56:560:56:58

where he pads around in jeans and socks.

0:56:580:57:03

But Hilton was often at odds with Cameron's other major special adviser.

0:57:030:57:07

The highly controversial Andy Coulson had the job of connecting Cameron to the tabloids.

0:57:070:57:13

Coulson had resigned as editor of the News of the World

0:57:130:57:16

while denying any involvement in phone-tapping by his journalists.

0:57:160:57:20

The affair continued to haunt him in Number 10, though Cameron tried to stick by him.

0:57:200:57:25

CAMERON: I choose to judge him by the work that he's done for me,

0:57:250:57:28

for the Government and for the country. He's run

0:57:280:57:32

the Downing Street press office

0:57:320:57:34

in a professional and competent and good way.

0:57:340:57:36

If you compare that with the days of the dodgy dossiers and Alastair Campbell and Damian McBride

0:57:360:57:42

and all that nonsense we had from the previous government,

0:57:420:57:45

he has done an excellent, excellent job.

0:57:450:57:47

Coulson resigned, saying that when the spokesman needs a spokesman, it's time to go.

0:57:470:57:53

After other presentation and policy gaffes, Cameron made a sharp U-turn.

0:57:530:57:58

He brought into Number 10 a new group of Blair-style special advisers

0:57:580:58:03

including a new political strategy chief and a ten-strong policy unit.

0:58:030:58:07

It was all a far cry from the Downing Street rose garden when a year earlier.

0:58:100:58:15

David Cameron was coming to realise that however sunny the start you make as Prime Minister,

0:58:150:58:20

cold reality will always follow you into Number 10.

0:58:200:58:25

Next week, in the last episode of this series,

0:58:270:58:29

I'll be uncovering the hidden network of high-powered Whitehall warriors

0:58:290:58:33

that operates to try and save ministers' skins

0:58:330:58:36

and keep the government of the day in power.

0:58:360:58:39

# I like my town

0:58:400:58:44

# With a little drop of poison

0:58:450:58:50

# Nobody knows

0:58:500:58:53

# They're lining up to go insane

0:58:530:58:57

# I'm all alone... #

0:58:570:59:01

Subtitles by Red Bee Media Ltd

0:59:010:59:04

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0:59:040:59:07

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