Tony Blair has been widely criticised on social media for his Christmas card. The card features the former Prime Minister and his wife Cherie looking thoroughly miserable, along with the message “Seasons Greetings”. Once the image of the card hit the internet people took to Twitter to suggest the couple looked like a wide range of TV characters such as the Demon Headmaster and Tubbs from the League of Gentlemen.

Others have pointed out that Tony Blair converted to Catholicism after he left office and started to talk about having a strong Christian phase, yet the card itself has no reference to Christmas. There has been suggestions that this might have something to do with his business interests in the Middle East.

The annual exchange of Christmas cards is always eagerly awaited in Westminster if for no other reason than to ridicule the bad ones. Some of the highlights from previous years include the MP for Morecambe, David Morris, adopting a similar pose to Eric Morecambe next to the famous statue of the comedian on the Morecambe promenade.

There was some suggestion yesterday that the Blair card was a spoof designed to embarrass the former Prime Minister and his wife. However, Blair’s private office have confirmed the card was issued by them and is intended to be entirely serious. 

Perhaps we should have guessed it was serious from the pose the two of them adopted.