The TV series on the New Labour years leaves you thinking that a repeat of the 1997 landslide will take a miracle
Boris Johnson may be prime minister, but over on BBC iPlayer there’s a Labour government. For five hour-long sessions, those fed up with life in a country now in its 12th consecutive year under a Tory leader can wallow in an alternative reality where it’s Labour that wins and wins and wins.
The opportunity comes via the documentary series Blair & Brown: The New Labour Revolution, which tells how the party went from the landslide defeat of 1983 to the landslide victory of 1997 and the story of the following 13 years in government. For those who contemplate the politics of 2021 and wish things would only get better, that first, winning episode is pure TV escapism: it’s Strictly for nerds.
Jonathan Freedland is a Guardian columnist
