Farewell to the technophobe prime minister

Although keen to tap into the youth and momentum of the tech industry and be seen with Bill Gates and other IT leaders, Tony Blair was almost proud to admit that he didn't know one end of a PC from the other.

Back in 2005, the Liberal Democrat's IT spokesman Richard Allan asked if it was true that on a personal level the prime minister was something of a technophobe. "I am afraid that is fair actually, yes," said the Prime Minister.

Whether that contributed to his government's poor record on IT projects is open to question — transport policy has also been criticised but no-one's ever asked the prime minister about his train-driving abilities — but it can't have helped much.

It's fair to say that Blair's lack of personal tech savvy was disappointing in a leader that expected the population to accept grand IT schemes such as UK Online and the controversial national ID card project.