article: Tony Blair has said he does not want to retire until he is 91 – as he unveiled plans to set up a ‘cadre’ of ex-leaders to advise governments around the world. The defiant 61-year-old former Prime Minister said he had ‘decades’ still in him and joked that he would ‘turn to drink’ if he ever stepped down from his multitude of global roles. He told Newsweek magazine that his latest ambition was to recruit former heads of government to go round the world to advise presidents and prime ministers on how to run their countries. In an interview with the magazine Newsweek Mr Blair said he did not want to retire until he was 91 years old . Mr Blair said his latest ambition is to recruit former heads of government to advise presidents and prime ministers on how to run their countries . Mr Blair said he himself had been ‘mentored’ by US president Bill Clinton when he took office in 1997. And he said he wanted to build up his organisations, such as his Faith Foundation, so they are ‘capable of changing global policy’. Last night, Tory MPs expressed horror at the prospect of Mr Blair remaining in public life for another 30 years. Andrew Bridgen said: ‘We all know weak Ed Miliband’s called on Tony to give his flailing campaign a boost, but the attention’s clearly gone to his head.’ Mr Blair addressing an audience on Tuesday in his former consistuency in Newton Aycliffe . Andrew Percy, another Conservative MP, said: 'There are many people who would be only too happy to send Tony Blair to the farthest reaches of Planet Earth.' Earlier this week, Mr Blair this week intervened in the election campaign by making a major speech accusing David Cameron of threatening economic chaos with his EU referendum pledge. Conservative MP Andrew Percy dismissed Mr Blair's claims about not retiring until he is 91 years old . And on Thursday he rallied the troops at Labour headquarters – telling them he was optimistic of victory and that he thought Mr Miliband did ‘amazingly’ in last week’s leaders’ debate. The former Labour leader has for the past eight years been the Quartet’s representative in the Middle East, and there were rumours last month that he was due to step down from this role. But, speaking to Newsweek, Mr Blair insisted his international work would continue, saying he wanted to emulate ex-Israeli president Shimon Peres who is still politically active at the age of 91. ‘I’ve got decades,’ said Mr Blair in an unpublished transcript of the Newsweek interview. ‘He is literally exactly 30 years older than me. I want to be seeing someone when I’m 91 after having had medical tests which show I’m getting younger. ‘The thought of actually retiring is not… Look, you have to got to have some self-awareness of these things. ‘And I just know if I do that, it would literally take me about three days before I was bored out of my mind. Took to drink or something.’ Mr Blair said he wanted to emulate former Israeli president Shimon Peres who is still politically active aged 91 . Inspiration: Mr Blair told Newsweek that all world leaders become 'war-hardened' with their experiences . He told the magazine that his new leaders’ club was needed because only former leaders truly understood leaders, he said. ‘The moment I’m talking to a new leader and I’m describing what I felt and what the challenges were, there’s a total and instant empathy; an immediate locking-on to each other,’ he said. ‘Whether they come from the Left or the Right, what they want is to get things done. And I know what it’s like because I’ve sat in the decision-making seat.’ The former premier said it was ‘bizarre’ that in politics, people ‘come from no experience of running a government at all to being head of a government’. Mr Blair said former leaders become ‘war-hardened’ with all their experience, and that it is ‘odd’ to expect they should retire and ‘play golf’. ‘You also have this very interesting thing when you can get a great leader of a small country,’ she said. ‘You can get some of these guys are who fantastic executors. ‘Why not use their talents and their experience? I want to build a cadre of people: “Why not come and help the President of this country or the Prime Minister of that country?”.’ Mr Blair said that former American president Bill Clinton mentored him once he came into office in 1997 . He added: ‘When I first came into office, I found Bill Clinton an immense help in a kind of mentoring process, if you like. If you knew at the beginning what you’d learned by the end, I mean you could obviously do a better job.’ Mr Blair said he wanted to turn the Faith Foundation and his other interests into ‘organisations of sufficient weight and influence that they change policy’. ‘I have a very clear view on what should happen on tackling extremism and the link with education and the link with bad religion,’ he said. ‘And you know that I want to build that foundation into something that is actually capable of changing global policy around this issue.’
highlights: The former Prime Minister claimed he has 'decades' of work left in him .
  Joked he would 'turn to drink' if he ever stepped down from global roles .
  Wants to recruit former government heads  to advise current leaders .
  He was ‘mentored’ by US president Bill Clinton when he started in 1997 .
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