2007 Sedgefield by-election 2007 Sedgefield by-election The Sedgefield by-election, 2007 was a by-election held on 19 July 2007 for the British House of Commons constituency of Sedgefield in County Durham. The Ealing Southall by-election was also held on 19 July. The by-election was triggered when Tony Blair, the Labour Party Member of Parliament (MP) for Sedgefield and former Prime Minister, "resigned" to become envoy for the international diplomatic Quartet on the Middle East. To resign as an MP, Blair accepted the office of Steward and Bailiff of the Three Hundreds of Chiltern, thereby deliberately disqualifying himself from Parliament and causing the by-election. Blair
Premiership of Tony Blair "The British Presidency: Tony Blair and the Politics of Public Leadership". Foley uses Blair’s premiership as a case study to further the ‘presidentialisation thesis’, which is a model used to study the growing power of the British Prime Minister at the behest of the Cabinet, and the Parliament. According to Foley, centralisation of power under Blair, and his broader conduct in office points to the cementing of presidential tendencies in British politics. He writes: “The British Prime Minister has evolved, and is evolving away from what a Prime Minister used to do and used to be… Blair’s premiership represents another