Documents relating to the Irish peace process at the British National Archives in Kew, London, are revealing about key moments on the way to implementing the Belfast Agreement signed in 1998, and the strategies of the British prime minister at that time, Tony Blair. Amid controversy in April 1999 about demands that the IRA decommission its weapons, Blair was focused on devising a solution and recorded: “I will need 3 clear days to work on it.”

Do British prime ministers have a run of “clear days” to work on anything any more? The office is over 300 years old, but never have there been so many in quick succession. Consider that between 1979 and 2007, there were only three prime ministers. Even before the latest upheavals, historian Anthony Seldon gave as the title of his 2021 book on the history of the position, The Impossible Office?

Observing the constant firefighting of the modern occupants of 10 Downing Street in an era of endless news cycles and saturation coverage, he wondered: “how much more effective and strategic might prime ministers be if they were allowed more space in their diaries?”

The lack of room is a measure of how the pace and optics of politics has shifted. In his 2019 study of nine more recent prime ministers, the former political editor of the New Statesman, Steve Richards, uses revealing phrases........

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