Blair: I will not beg for support

In an emotional radio interview, the Prime Minister acknowledged the corrosive damage to his government's reputation but defiantly rejected calls to stand down.

Read more... • Blair: PM in paralysis

• Benedict Brogan: The Prime Minister is not going quietly

• A fully elected Lords is only way to avoid rows over peerages, says Hain

• Blair gets a grilling from Humphrys over cash-for-honours allegations

• How Blair is likely to go

With a note of bitterness in his voice he urged the public not to believe media reports about cover-ups at No10 but said he would not plead with anyone about his integrity.

"I'm not going to beg for my character in front of anyone," he said. " People can make up their mind about me according to what they think about me. But I know what type of person I am.

"I'm not going to get into a situation where I'm sort of pleading for my integrity, not even actually in front of the public, even though I obviously have a deep respect for the British people-and it's been an honour and privilege to lead them.

"I try and do my best, I have tried to do my best over the last 10 years. I don't say I have always got everything right. Of course, I have not. There have been mistakes and things that have gone wrong along the way.

"But actually when I look back on my 10 years I do believe that there is a lot that has been good for the country as well."

Mr Blair spoke against a backdrop of Labour grandees warning of the damage that the sleaze claims were inflicting. But he said it would be "wrong" for him to quit before the police probe was over.

"I have said I will stand down this parliament but I have said there are things I want to conclude," he said, indicating he still intends to stay until after an EU summit in late June.

Asked why Chancellor Gordon Brown could not take over those duties, he answered: "Because I do not think that's the right thing to do. I think it would be particularly wrong to do it before the inquiry has even run its course ."

He added: "So you will have to put up with me for a bit longer."

In the interview, for BBC Radio 4's Today programme, he said the inquirywas "obsessive and distracting for the media" but "not for me".

The rare grilling by John Humphrys was being seen as an attempt by the Prime Minister to show he was still capable of pushing on with a domestic agenda of pubic service reforms.

Mr Blair said he hoped the inquiry would be "wound up" in the next few weeks. "I think it has got to run its course over the next few weeks and I hope it will be wound up... in the meantime, despite what people think, I get on with the job," he added.

He was asked whether it was true, as he claimed shortly after coming to power, that: "People think I'm a pretty straight kind of guy."

Mr Blair replied: "I thought you might ask me that. I thought about how I should answer and I got the same thing put to me during the course of the last election when people were calling me a liar and a war criminal.

"Maybe this is how I have changed over the years as well. I said then during the election campaign and I would say now... I'm not going to beg for my character in front of anyone."

The Prime Minister, speaking from a makeshift radio studio in his Sedgefield constituency, said "scandal and controversy" were part of modern politics and media coverage.

He made a staunch defence of his 10 years in office. He said Britain had the strongest economy of any of its major competitors, pensioners had been lifted out of poverty and the NHS was "definitely in a better state".

"I look back on those 10 years and if you had told me 10 years on these are the facts about the country I would have bitten your hand off for it," he said.

He said he had once "liked to be liked" but now he was more concerned about doing the right thing.

The Premier's authority has been visibly ebbing at Westminster after a torrid fortnight of allegations of cover-ups and deleted emails, plus the arrests of two of his closest aides, Lord Levy and Ruth Turner.

Yesterday's revelation that Mr Blair had been interviewed by police for a second time triggered a bout of public agonising from Labour grandees.

Former leader Neil Kinnock, party chairman Hazel Blears and deputy leadership contender Harriet Harman all issued warnings that the cashforpeerages probe was causing damage.

Lord Kinnock said the damage could "take years to repair."

"It's done damage to politics, and the political democratic process." he told BBC News 24's Straight Talk.