David Blunkett has insisted he can become a radical, reforming home secretary despite the preoccupations of the war on terror.

Interviewed in the Society section of the Guardian, David Blunkett defends his record as home secretary and insists he is no hardliner.

"You have to carry people with you, rather than being pushed backwards by reaction. I think that we can open up new areas. I think Nixon recognising China is an interesting analogy," he said.

"You have to secure confidence and trust before you can push ahead with things more rapidly and with greater certainty of gaining consensus than you could otherwise."

And he denied that he has been hardline on issues such as race and terrorism.

"I don't expect to be given credit for being the most progressive and liberal home secretary," he said. "But if people look at what we have done so far they would be quite surprised."

Human rights

But he conceded that September 11 and the war on terror has radically altered his role - sometimes pushing human rights issues out of the picture.

He said responding to the new terror threat did present challenges on the issue of personal freedom and rights.

"Given the complexities and the legal niceties, and given the proportionality and human rights questions, that was a major challenge. I found it an invigorating challenge, but I also thought it stretched what was required of an individual secretary of state probably to the limit, given the timescale we were dealing with." he said.

"In the immediate aftermath of September 11, more than half of his time on some days was taken up with dealing with terrorist issues. It is not as intense now, but the balance changes from month to month.

"Over Christmas and New Year, with the exception of Christmas Day, every single day I had to deal with some issue relating to counter-terrorism, and that obviously does impinge."