Blair exits to cheers and tears

By Katherine Baldwin

TRIMDON (Reuters) - The pop music was just as raucous and the crowd just as ecstatic. The difference was that, this time, Tony Blair was on his way out.

Twenty-four years ago, Blair was at Trimdon Labour Club in County Durham to celebrate his first election to parliament.

In 1997, he partied in this former mining village with jubilant supporters as the Labour Party won the landslide victory that made him prime minister.

And Blair triggered cheers and tears amongst the party faithful by choosing the club once more to announce to Trimdon, Britain and the world that he would be handing the Queen his resignation on June 27.

Many of those who packed the club on Thursday to hear him announce his resignation had been with him from the start.

Showing no sign of losing his magic media touch, Blair told his supporters "hand on heart, I did what I thought was right" in an inspired piece of political theatre.

Wearing a red tie, Blair enthusiastically embraced his agent John Burton, his wife Cherie and close friends and activists.

"He's brilliant. It's been brilliant for us," said Lena Devine, 72, fishing a photograph out of her handbag of a fresh-faced Blair eating a pie at the Black Bull pub in 1984.