TONY Blair’s memories of his transformation from a North East MP to Prime Minister dramatically reopened Labour Party rows yesterday.

In his memoirs, published on the day the first votes were cast in a leadership election, Mr Blair warned that the party faces defeat at the next election if it abandons the New Labour agenda he framed as prime minister.

His autobiography sets out how he nearly lost his Sedgefield seat to left wingers, and how he constantly struggled against Gordon Brown and his allies to shape Labour into the party he envisioned. The former Prime Minister draws on his time in the North East, and Sedgefield, throughout the book as he tries to secure his legacy as a down-to- Earth politician.

There is also frequent praise for South Shields MP and Labour leadership front-runner David Miliband, though the former premier was careful in the book and interviews promoting it not to endorse any of the five candidates to succeed Gordon Brown.

David Miliband made no public comment on the autobiography, but his brother Ed said it was time to “move on from Tony Blair and Gordon Brown and Peter Mandelson” and that he was the candidate best placed to “turn the page“ on that era.

Another contender, Andy Burnham, accused Mr Blair of “re-running the battles of the past“, adding: “Labour needs to leave all this behind. Members are fed up with it. Most are not Blairites or Brownites, Old or New Labour. They are just Labour.”

Mr Blair’s book, A Journey, lays bare the rift between himself and Mr Brown during his time in power, as well as his concerns about his chancellor’s fitness to follow him into 10 Downing Street.

Describing Mr Brown as brilliant but “maddening“, Mr Blair blamed his successor for losing the last election by deviating from the New Labour message.

“Labour won when it was New Labour. It lost because it stopped being New Labour,” he wrote.