5月10日，英國首相布萊爾將宣布他何時辭去工黨領袖職務，從而讓財政大臣布朗接掌相印。 在英國執政10年，布萊爾早年的光環漸被參加伊戰的陰影所籠罩。早在去年9月，他就遭遇工黨“逼宮”，被迫宣布自己將在1年之內辭職。

Tony Blair

Ten years after sweeping into power in Britain, an increasingly unpopular Tony Blair will announce on Thursday when he plans to step aside and allow finance minister Gordon Brown totake overas prime minister.

Blair will be remembered for helping bring peace to Northern Ireland after decades of violence, winning three straight elections for Labour for the first time and dragging his party away from its left-wing roots to the center of British politics.

But he leaves office out of favor among voters and within his party for sending British troops to Iraq in 2003. A Labour rebellion in September forced him to say he would quit within a year.

He had long been expected to hand over power before the end of this third term to let another Labour leader pilot the party into the next election, expected in 2009.

Brown, whose official residence is next door to Blair's in London's Downing Street, has waited with increasing impatience for the departure of his neighbor. Critics say their rivalry, often bitter, has diluted the government's effectiveness.

Blair quits as only the second prime minister in a century to have served 10 years, tainted by a corruption scandal in which he became the first serving prime minister to be quizzed by police in a criminal probe.

His spokesman said Blair will make a statement about his future on Thursday. The prime minister will attend a cabinet meeting in London and then fly to his constituency in northern England to speak to local supporters.

Blair and Brown were the twin architects of Labour's rise to power in 1997 after 18 years in the political wilderness and Britain's long-serving finance minister is now certain to finally get the job he has coveted for so long.

His chief challenge will be to revive support for Labour and overhaul the opposition Conservatives in the opinion polls before the next election.

Brown is widely respected for presiding over a decade of strong economic growth and for granting independence to Britain's central bank to set interest rates.

He has also overseen huge increases in spending on education and health. But Labour has not been rewarded by the electorate for its public service spending and Brown does not have the charismatic charm that helped Blair rule for a decade.

（Agencies） 

Vocabulary:    

take over as prime minister：接任首相  

（英語點津陳蓓編輯）