Debt Relief

I must say I'm pleasantly surprised by the US's change of stance, in allocating additional funds for use in debt relief. This was an unexpected victory for Blair. Don't get me wrong, the failure to secure the overall goals of 100% debt relief, written off against increases in the value of IMF gold reserves, is bad, but it could have been much worse if the US had not agreed to some extra money.

Now, obviously I'm not putting this solely down to the mph campaign, but did it maybe influence Blair to make his case a little more strongly to Bush? If so, then it is also a small victory for mph.

Of course I am speculating, but it seems feasible that, worried by a potential backlash at home, Blair pushed Bush slightly harder on the issue and was able to gain this concession from Bush.

Prior to the meeting, Bush had insisted that any funding for debt relief had to be taken from future aid, and not be additional help.