Tony B-liar is world’s best paid speaker

[julian_craster]

From The Sunday Times

April 5, 2009

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/politics/article6037174.ece



Tony B- liar is world’s best paid speaker



by Robert Watts and Michael Sheridan





TONY B- LIAR has emerged as the world’s highest-paid public speaker, earning almost £400,000 for two half-hour speeches in his latest appearance on the international lecture circuit.



He received the fee during a 36-hour visit to the Philippines, where he lodged with the British ambassador.



Blair’s oratory - which cost more than £6,000 a minute - included such insights as “politics really matters, but a lot of what goes on is not great” and “religion [can be] a source of inspiration, or an excuse for evil”.



The former prime minister, who has earned more than £15m since leaving Downing Street almost two years ago, also observed: “Politicians are a very strange people” and “helping people is a noble profession - but not noble to pursue”. Some of the 2,000 tickets were priced at more than £350.





Manny Pangilinan, chairman of PLDT, a telecoms company that sponsored the speech at Ateneo de Manila University, told the local press that Blair was paid €200,000 (£182,000) for a talk entitled The Leader as Nation Builder in a Time of Globalisation.



A spokesman for Blair denied that he had requested or received payment in euros, a stronger currency than the pound. He would not clarify whether the payment was made in dollars or sterling.



Later that day Blair delivered a second lecture, The Leader as Principled Negotiator, for a similar fee at a luxury hotel.



He was flown into Manila by private jet on March 23 and conveyed by helicopter to the venue for his first speech. He found time during his brief visit to have lunch with President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo at Malacanang Palace, once the residence of Ferdinand and Imelda Marcos.



While many public speakers have had to cut their rates since the onset of the recession, Blair’s fees have remained buoyant.



Bill Clinton, the former US president, was regularly netting about $150,000 (£103,000) per speech until he cut back on his public speaking earlier this year when his wife Hillary became the US secretary of state.



His successor, George W Bush, is reported to have charged $150,000 per speech since leaving the White House. However, it is thought unlikely that Bush will be able to command such rates for long.



Al Gore, the former US vice-president who has reinvented himself as a climate change campaigner, charges about $100,000 for an hour-long speech.



Sylvia Tidy-Harris, who has organised speaking engagements for British politicians such as William Hague, the shadow foreign secretary, and John Prescott, the former deputy prime minister, said she was surprised by Blair’s pulling power.



“I can understood Bill Clinton’s appeal – every man wants to pat him on the back and every woman wants to be the next Monica Lewinsky,” she said. “But Tony Blair . . . he just doesn’t have that charisma.”



A spokesman for Blair said: “He is in great demand for his insight and analysis, which is a tribute to the high esteem in which he is held.”



Next month Blair is to address an audience of 2,000 at the Arlington theatre in Santa Barbara, California. Tickets are on sale for up to £279.



As well as a handsome income from public speaking, Blair, 55, also receives about £2m a year as an adviser to JP Morgan Chase, the investment bank, and is paid a further £500,000 a year for a similar role at Zurich Financial Services. He has signed a £4.6m deal for his memoirs.

[Steve Crook]

You missed a few places where you could have hyphenated Blair into B-liar.

(Just to make the point that that was your editorialising the original article )



Steve

[narabdela]

If people are willing to pay this, then good luck to him.



(btw, the "B-Liar" thing is really rather childish)

[davidb]

does he make a contribution to a fund of some sort for the dead and injured of the war he started ?

[Marky B]

name='narabdela']If people are willing to pay this, then good luck to him.



(btw, the "B-Liar" thing is really rather childish)

You are right - it is childish. However,it is the truth.

Ta Ta

Marky B

[CliveT]

What an obscene way to build up your bank account! Prattle on about anything as long as you get a fat cheque in your hand, then go on to the next speech. Pity TB wasn't more concerned about the UK and the aftermath of his governments policies rather than personal enrichment. What qualities do you have to offer to be paid such amounts, I would love to know!





CliveT

[davidb]

it'll be a good money spinner till he gets president of europe

if that happens i will build a raft if need be and set off for another continent

[Steve Crook]

name='CliveT']What an obscene way to build up your bank account! Prattle on about anything as long as you get a fat cheque in your hand, then go on to the next speech. Pity TB wasn't more concerned about the UK and the aftermath of his governments policies rather than personal enrichment. What qualities do you have to offer to be paid such amounts, I would love to know!





CliveT

Is anyone surprised? It's what all politicians do. Of all parties, from all countries.

As soon as they leave office they sign up for a load of non-executive directorships and then go on the after dinner speaking circuit.



You don't need any qualities to do it, you just need to be a well known name. The better known you are (or were) the higher the fee you charge



If they had any morals then they wouldn't have become politicians in the first place - and they certainly wouldn't have survived long as a politician or got to any position of note.



And this isn't specific to Blair, it applies to all of them, from all parties, from all countries.



Steve

[Mark O]

name='davidb']it'll be a good money spinner till he gets president of europe

if that happens i will build a raft if need be and set off for another continent

I think I'll join you David, I'm not a 'hate' person but I'll make exception in his case, along with his hatchet-faced money grabbing wife, he's the one with blood on his hands if not on his conscience, how he can sleep at night after seeing images of our brave troops with limbs missing I don't know (maybe he's not aware of what he's responsible for)..........the bloke makes me SICK!

[Marky B]

name='Mark O']I think I'll join you David, I'm not a 'hate' person but I'll make exception in his case, along with his hatchet-faced money grabbing wife, he's the one with blood on his hands if not on his conscience, how he can sleep at night after seeing images of our brave troops with limbs missing I don't know (maybe he's not aware of what he's responsible for)..........the bloke makes me SICK!

Sarah Brown is a far contrast from the Wicked Witch (Mrs Bliar). Like Norma Major,she didn't hog the limelight but quietly got on with things without publicity. Mrs Major became a Dame for her untrumpeted charity work. I started going off King Tone and the WIcked Witch when they stole the celebrations of the Queen and Prince Phillip's Golden Wedding celebrations.

I don't begrudge people with money,but I begrudge it to man (and woman) who begrudge other people having money. I thought Labour was the working class party.

Ta Ta

Marky B

[Moor Larkin]

name='julian_craster']From The Sunday Times

April 5, 2009



Tony B- liar is world’s best paid speaker.

Seems only fair....... He made up the best stories.............

[Steve Crook]

name='Marky B']I thought Labour was the working class party.

Where have you been for the last 10+ years?

This is New Labour, they denied all connections with the old Labour party



Steve

[alan gowdy]

Shock! Horror! Tony Blair making lots of money from giving speeches? Good for him. Thatcher did it. They'd all do it if it was offered.

[davidb]

name='alan gowdy']Shock! Horror! Tony Blair making lots of money from giving speeches? Good for him. Thatcher did it. They'd all do it if it was offered.

the state he's left the country in ,im surprised anybody wants to pay for it . in fact its more of a surprise anybodys got any money to pay for it .

im tempted to say that it would be ok if there was a sniper in the audience ,but thats a wrong thing to suggest ...........a quick kill by a sniper is too good for him

[alan gowdy]

name='davidb']the state he's left the country in ,im surprised anybody wants to pay for it . in fact its more of a surprise anybodys got any money to pay for it .

im tempted to say that it would be ok if there was a sniper in the audience ,but thats a wrong thing to suggest ...........a quick kill by a sniper is too good for him

Perhaps it's too easy to forget how much Margaret Thatcher was loathed and despised by half the population when and after she was Prime Minister (the other half loved her) and she earned a fortune ear bashing on the speaking circuit in the US. Actually Blair got out before the country was in a state (if you mean financially). Poor old Gordon Brown is left to pick up the pieces and claim - rightly - that most of the current mess was not of our doing.

But hey... they are politicians, so what do you expect?

[Lord Lionheart]

........................yet there'll be more posts of moral outrage on the Jade Goody threads of the worlds forums as he's a respectable educated, lawyer and politician ( read mass murdering lying money-grubbing two faced git)

[GRAEME]

Who would really want to hear him - let alone pay to listen to him? It's a taxation on rich idiots!



I've heard him for free a couple of times and he's an empty, if slick, performer.



History will remember him as the PM who involved us in the Iraq war on a foundation of lies. If he wants to change that he'd better pull his finger out and broker peace in the Middle East rather than waste time feathering his own already comfortable nest.



As a Catholic he should be more interested in redemption. Save some lives Tony, for a change.

[LukeAFB]

"Poor Gordon Brown"??? Firstly he didn't have to take the job (take, being the operative word here). Secondly, he'll be on the gravy train as soon as 'New Labour' are kicked out next year. I wonder how he will explain the worst defeat in Labour's history?

[Marky B]

name='LukeAFB']Secondly, he'll be on the gravy train as soon as 'New Labour' are kicked out next year. I wonder how he will explain the worst defeat in Labour's history?

You could be right there,but as one man said,a week is a long time in politics,so I don't think we can assume as yet New Labour will be kicked out.

Ta Ta

Marky B

[DB7]

I don't mind him, but I do manage to see a rounder picture.



Btw what does 'B-lair' mean?