Blair 'will defy calls to quit'
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 Blair wins election, but voters deliver a verdict on the war in Iraq.
 British Prime Minister Tony Blair celebrates victory on Friday.
 British Conservative Leader Michael Howard thanks everyone in his re-election.
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LONDON, England -- British Prime Minister Tony Blair was finalizing his third-term ministerial appointments Monday as he moved to face down calls for him to quit.
Blair will tell Labour MPs he will not leave office early when they meet later this week for the first time since last week's election, aides said.
The British PM has come under fierce attack from Labour party backbenchers since his majority was slashed from 161 to 67.
On Monday former minister Clare Short joined the chorus of senior politicians urging him to quit. "I think it would be best for him (Blair) and for the government and for the Labour Party if he announced that he was going pretty soon and we agreed a process for selecting a new leader around the time of (party) conference," she told the BBC.
But she added: "I don't think he'll do it." Short said the whole story of the government would be "When is he going?"
Bookmakers William Hill on Sunday cut odds on Blair quitting by December from 12/1 to 8/1 after "a number" of weekend bets, The Sun said.
Blair promised his third term would bring "radical" legislation on health, education and law and order. But Labour's smaller majority could loosen his grip on power and give more room to rebels who want him to step down in favor of heir apparent and finance minister Gordon Brown.
Blair, 52, has said he will serve a full third term but not take the Labour Party into another election. Thursday's victory marked the first time a Labour leader had won a third straight election.
One backbench Labour MP, John Austin, said if Blair did not step aside he could face a leadership challenge from within his own party. Austin even offered to stand against the prime minister as a "stalking horse" candidate if there were no more "plausible candidates."
Many senior members of the party have rallied to Blair's defense though. Northern Ireland and Wales Secretary Peter Hain urged lawmakers to focus on the legislative agenda to be unveiled May 17.
"These are the big agenda items, not internal voices squabbling about a future leadership succession when actually we have just won an historic third term," he said, The Associated Press reported.
Meanwhile the Cabinet reshuffle showed signs of a new power struggle between Blair, who is anxious to shake off "lame duck" accusations, and Brown, according to media reports.
Monday's Daily Mail referred to a "departure lounge Cabinet" that was "packed with time-expired politicians waiting to be sacked by Gordon Brown when he takes over."
The chancellor was said to be resisting the appointment of Blair's education adviser Andrew Adonis as schools minister.
Education Secretary Ruth Kelly had been rumored to be heading back to the Treasury as chief secretary. Kelly has remained in her post but it is not clear whether Adonis would be made a peer and become her deputy when the rest of the new government is unveiled.
Iraq critics
Labour left-winger Jeremy Corbyn, a fierce critic of Blair's decision to go to war in Iraq, predicted the prime minister could be out of Downing Street within a year.
"I think he might well decide that the end of the G-8 presidency is the time to go," Corbyn told Channel 4. "I don't think he would want to go in the middle of it."
Britain's one-year presidency of the Group of Eight major industrialized countries concludes at the end of 2005.
Other MPs suggested Blair might want to step down after a UK referendum on the European Union constitution expected to be held next spring -- or even after the French referendum on the EU charter later this month.
"In many ways I think the French electorate will decide the timing because if the French vote 'no' then there will be really no rational reason for him to stay on," said former Labour health secretary Frank Dobson.
Writing in The Mail on Sunday, actress and former minister Glenda Jackson, a north London MP and vocal critic of the Iraq war, said: "The people have spoken. In fact they've screamed at the top of their lungs. And their message is clear. They want Tony Blair gone."
The Observer newspaper reported that within Blair's private circle, the timetable being discussed would involve him triggering a party leadership contest in July 2008 and remaining as prime minister while the succession is resolved, allowing the new leader to take over that autumn.
Helen Clark, Labour MP for whose Peterborough seat fell to the Conservatives last Thursday, has said she is leaving the party and applying to join the Tories in protest at Blair's "remote" style of government.
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Associated Press contributed to this report.
