In October 2004, Tony Blair announced that he would be having surgery to correct his minor heart defect. Looking at the chart for his heart scare last year, you can see the triggers to his natal Mars, Mercury and Saturn Neptune conunction.

Mars is square itself, Uranus was square his Jupiter, having squared his Mars and transiting Mercury was conjunct his natal Saturn Neptune conjunction in his sixth house. Progressed Mercury had just reached his IC and, by virtue of their tight square, was squaring his natal Mercury. At the time of the doctor being called, 9.30 am, the degree of his Sun was about to set. There are many signatures for hearts and shocks and rapid rhythms and those I've just listed do seems to cover quite a few of them. It is even more alarming when you take into account the fact that Blair's ascendant ruler, Mercury, is also the ruler of his sixth house. Could this be the sign of an underlying health problem? I wrote about this in Transit, November 2003, after the first scare and I still agree with the conclusions I made then. This is a man who needs to look after his health but who would not necessarily view himself as sickly. Looking at the astrology of the morning of the operation you can see many of the same triggers in action. I've shown the chart with the degree of his Sun setting as this would have happened at some point during the procedure and does resonate with the first incident. We know that he left Downing Street at 7.00 am and that an announcement was made on the radio that the procedure was over was made at 12.15.

Mars this time was trine to its own position, probably indicating the planned nature of the event. Uranus was tightly square his natal Mars and Saturn had stationed on his IC and square his Mercury. Mercury, as we've already said, is the ruler of his sixth house. His progressed Mercury has now moved into Leo and is still near his IC in the fourth house. There will be another pass of Uranus to his natal Mars, in December 2004 but there are fewer of these additional triggers at that time.

The major reason I would order Mr Blair to have two weeks enforced rest is the coming eclipse which will conjoin his Saturn Neptune conjunction in his sixth house and transiting Mercury will square itself from the top of his chart. By bestriding the globe like superman, he may have exacerbated a situation which would take care of itself with a little TLC (tender loving care).

Blair's Mercury square MC/IC has seen a lot of tension recently, from both slower and faster moving planets. The last quarter Moon saw Sun, Moon and Saturn all at 27 degrees of cardinal; the solar eclipse Mercury was at 27 Capricorn and Mars is moving to square Saturn on 6th November passing 21 Libra, the degree of the solar eclipse and Blair's Saturn Neptune conjunction, on the day of the Grand Quintile, which will focus even more stressful energy through his sixth house ruler.

Saturn conjunct the IC is also very apt for someone who has just bought a substantial property, but if I had a Saturn ruled MC and Saturn was transiting my IC and I lived over the shop, I might worry a bit about my future. The next few months will be crucial for Blair's health and his political career. In addition to Blair's announcements about his health, he made explicit declarations about his intention to fight the next election and remain leader for a third term.

This news would have been particularly interesting to Gordon Brown, widely seen as the obvious successor to Blair. Some commentators have speculated that his time has passed and this is reflected by the fact that his Sun at zero degrees Pisces has received all the transits from Uranus for this cycle. However, he does have Mercury and Mars in Pisces which will be squared by Pluto early next year.

There is a tragic air to the succession and it may be that the chosen one will not be Brown and will come from one of the other young bucks that are jostling for position.