History of the Conservative Party
Encyclopedia
The modern Conservative Party
of the United Kingdom
, also known as the Unionist Party in the early 20th century, traces its origins back to the "Tory" supporters of Duke of York
, later King James VII&II, during the 1678-1681 exclusion. The name was originally meant as a pejorative—a 'Tory' was a type of Irish bandit.
The name 'Conservative' was suggested by John Wilson Croker
in the 1830s and later officially adopted, but the party is still often referred to as the 'Tory Party' (not least because newspaper editors find it a convenient shorthand when space is limited). The Tories more often than not formed the government
from the accession of King George III
(in 1760) until the Reform Act 1832
.
Widening of the franchise in the 19th century led the party to popularise its approach, especially under Benjamin Disraeli, his own Reform Act
coming in 1867. After 1886, the Conservatives allied with the part of the Liberal Party
known as the Liberal Unionists who opposed their party's support for Irish Home Rule and held office for all but three of the following twenty years. During this period the party was generally known as the Unionist Party, and it suffered a large defeat when the party split over tariff reform in 1906.
World War I
saw an all-party coalition, and for four years after the armistice the party remained in coalition with the Lloyd George Liberals. Eventually, grassroots pressure forced the breakup of the Coalition, and the party regained power on its own. It again dominated the political scene in the inter-war period, from 1931 in a 'National Government
' coalition. However in the 1945 general election
the party lost power in a landslide to the Labour Party
.
After the end of the Second World War
, the Conservatives accepted the reality of the Labour government's nationalisation programme, the creation of the 'welfare state', and the high taxes required for all of it. But when they returned to power in 1951 the party oversaw an economic boom and ever-increasing national prosperity throughout the 1950s. The party stumbled in the 1960s and 1970s, but in 1975 Margaret Thatcher became leader and converted it to a monetarist economic programme; after her election victory in 1979 her government became known for its free market
approach to problems and privatisation of public utilities. Here, the Conservatives experienced a high-point, Thatcher leading the Conservatives to two more landslide election victories in 1983 and 1987.
However, towards the end of the 1980s, Thatcher's increasing unpopularity and unwillingness to change policies perceived as vote-losing led to her being deposed in 1990 and replaced by John Major
who won an unexpected election victory in 1992. Major's government suffered a political blow when the Pound Sterling
was forced out of the Exchange Rate Mechanism
later that year, which lost the party much of its reputation for good financial stewardship. Although the country's economy recovered in the mid-1990s, an effective opposition campaign by the Labour Party led to a landslide defeat in 1997.
and his successors, who gradually came to be called Tories. In the late 1820s disputes over political reform broke up this grouping. A government led by the Duke of Wellington
collapsed amidst dire election results. Following this disaster Robert Peel
set about assembling a new coalition of forces. Peel issued the Tamworth Manifesto
in 1834 which set out the basic principles of Conservatism
and that year he formed a temporary government. On the fall of Lord Melbourne
's government in 1841 Peel took office with a substantial majority and appeared set for a long rule.
. Peel and most senior Conservatives favoured repeal, but they were opposed by backbench members representing farming and rural constituencies, led by Lord George Bentinck
, Benjamin Disraeli
, and Lord Stanley
(later the Earl of Derby), who favoured protectionism
. Following repeal, the Protectionists combined with the Whigs to overthrow Peel's government. It would be twenty-eight years before a Conservative Prime Minister again had a majority in the House of Commons.
From this point on, and especially after the death of Peel in 1850, the Peelites and Conservatives drifted apart. Most of the Peelites joined with the Whigs and Radicals to form the Liberal Party
in 1859, under the leadership of Lord Palmerston
.
, which broadened the franchise. Disraeli's mixed message of patriotism and promises of social reforms managed to win him enough working-class support to win a majority in 1874
, but the Conservative hold remained tenuous, and Disraeli was defeated in the election of 1880
. It was not until the split in the Liberal Party
over Irish home rule in 1886 that the Conservatives were able to achieve truly secure majorities through the defection of the Liberal Unionists
.
became Prime Minister.
The party then split on the issue of Tariff Reform. The controversy had been taken up by the Liberal Unionist cabinet minister Joseph Chamberlain
, who was Colonial Secretary
. Like the earlier schism over the Corn Laws
in 1846, the result lead to polarisation within the coalition between those who supported Chamberlain and his 'Imperial Preference', and those who opposed him in defence of the status quo and Free Trade
. The split went across both Unionist parties. With the beleaguered Balfour in the middle, the government struggled on for another two years and saw many Unionist MPs defect to the Liberals. These defectors included the future Conservative party leader Winston Churchill
in 1904.
ended in a landslide defeat for the Unionists and their numbers were reduced to only 157 MPs. The Unionists had been suffering as a result of the unpopular Boer War
, (known as Joe's War, a particular link to Joseph Chamberlain) as well as the unpopular tariff reforms proposed by Chamberlain, which faced the growing popularity of free trade
amongst the population. Chamberlain himself was told to keep his "hands off the peoples food!" Balfour lost his own seat (although he soon returned to Parliament in a by-election) and this left the pro-tariff reformers within the Unionists as a large majority. However, the stroke suffered by Joseph Chamberlain in July 1906 effectively removed him from political influence. The cause of Tariff reform would now be promoted by Chamberlain's son Austen Chamberlain
.
The Unionists strongly opposed many of the proposed reforms of the new Liberal governments of Campbell-Bannerman
and Asquith. In 1910, the Unionist-dominated House of Lords
rejected the so-called "People's Budget
", leading to a long conflict over the nature and constitutional place of the House of Lords. The Conservatives managed to make up much of their losses in both the January and December elections of 1910. This forced the Liberals to rely on Irish Nationalist votes to maintain their majority. Although the Liberals were able to force through the effective subjugation of the Lords with the Parliament Act 1911
, their advocacy once again cost them support, so that by the time of the outbreak of World War I
a Unionist victory in the next election looked possible. Liberal mismanagement of the early phases World War I led to the return of the Unionists to power: first in coalition with Asquith's Liberals, and then, with the split and collapse of the Liberals, the Unionists under Andrew Bonar Law were able to become the dominant party in Lloyd George's
coalition government following the 1918 election
.
For the next few years it seemed possible that the Liberals who supported Lloyd George and the Conservatives would merge into a new political grouping. However the reluctance of these Liberals to lose their identity ended this ambition and the moment was lost. From then on the rumblings of discontent within the coalition over issues such as the Soviet Union
, trade unions and the Irish issue (leading to the de facto independence for the Irish Free State
in 1921 led to many Conservatives hoping to break with Lloyd George. Bonar Law resigned in 1921 on the grounds of ill health and the parliamentary party was now led by Austen Chamberlain
. Previously a contender for party leadership in 1911, Chamberlain was to prove ineffective in controlling his party—even passing up the offer of becoming Prime Minister when Lloyd George indicated he was willing to step down. The party eventually broke free from Lloyd George in October 1922 as the result of a meeting of MPs at the Carlton Club
. They voted against remaining in the coalition and Chamberlain resigned. He was actually replaced by Bonar Law, who had been persuaded by friends and allies to return to lead the party.
After winning the election of 1922
, Bonar Law, now terminally ill with throat cancer, was to resign for good from political life in May 1923. He died later that year. Though holding a majority in government, the party was still split, as many of those who stayed to the bitter end of the former coalition had refused to take office in Law's cabinet. Their absence explains why the hitherto unknown Stanley Baldwin
was to become leader of the party barely two years after first entering a major ministerial post.
The party reached a new height in the inter-war years under Baldwin's leadership. His mixture of strong social reforms and steady government proved a powerful election combination, with the result that the Conservatives governed Britain either by themselves or as the leading component of the National Government
for most of the interwar years and all through World War II
. The Conservatives under Baldwin were also the last political party in Britain to gain over 50% of the vote (in the general election of 1931
). Yet at the conclusion of hostilities, the British public felt a different party would best guide them through the peace, and the Conservatives were soundly defeated in the 1945 General Election
by a resurgent Labour Party.
government's social reforms whilst also offering a distinctive Conservative edge, as set out in their 1947 poicy statement Industrial Charter
. They returned to government in 1951
under Churchill. Churchill remained leader for another four years, during which time the Conservatives showed their acceptance of Labour reforms, though modifying some, such as the denationalisation the steel industry. In 1955 Churchill retired and was succeeded by Sir Anthony Eden
. Eden had an immense personal popularity and lengthy experience as Foreign Secretary, but his government ran into a number of troubles on the domestic front as the economy began to overheat. In international affairs the government was confronted by the decision of the Egypt
ian government of Gamal Abdel Nasser
to nationalise the Suez Canal
. Eden agreed to a secret collaboration with France
and Israel
to retake the Canal, but the resulting operation [see Suez Crisis
] backfired miserably and left the United Kingdom heavily embarrassed abroad and Eden discredited at home. With his health failing, Eden resigned at the beginning of 1957.
The succession was contentious, with Rab Butler
as the favourite to succeed. However, it was Harold Macmillan
who became the next Prime Minister and leader of the party. Macmillan sought to rebuild the government's image both at home and abroad, and presided over strong economic growth and a massive expansion in the consumer-product economy. In 1959 he won the general election of that year
on this economic success, summed up in the slogan "You've never had it so good." However, rising unemployment and an economic downturn in the early 1960s eroded support for Macmillan's government. It was further rocked in 1963 by the resignation of the Secretary of State for War John Profumo
over the Profumo Affair
. In October 1963 Macmillan was misdiagnosed with terminal cancer and resigned.
The party at this time lacked a formal process for electing a new leader and Macmillan's resignation took place in the week of the annual Conservative Party Conference. This event rapidly became an American-style convention as leading ministers sought to establish their credentials. Eventually Macmillan formally recommended to the Queen
that she appoint the Earl of Home
as Prime Minister. Home was appointed and renounced his peerage, becoming Sir Alec Douglas-Home, but was unable to restore the party's fortunes and narrowly lost the 1964 general election
.
Following the 1964 defeat, the party formally installed a system for electing the leader. Douglas-Home stepped down in 1965 and the election to succeed him
was won by Edward Heath
over both Reginald Maudling
and Enoch Powell
. The party proceeded to lose the 1966 general election
. Heath's leadership proved controversial, with frequent calls from many prominent party members and supporters for him to step down, but he persevered. To the shock of almost everyone bar Heath, the party won the 1970 general election
.
As with all British governments in this period, Heath's time in office was difficult. Furthermore, the Heath premiership remains one of the most controversial in the history of the party. Initial attempts to follow monetarist policies (later considered "Thatcherite") failed, with high inflation and unemployment blocking Heath's attempts at reforming the increasingly militant trade unions. The era of 1970s British industrial unrest had arrived.
The Troubles
in Northern Ireland would lead Heath to suspending the Parliament of Northern Ireland
and introducing direct rule
as a precursor to establishing a power-sharing executive under the Sunningdale Agreement
. This resulted in the Conservative Party losing the support of the Ulster Unionist Party
at Westminster, which was to have consequences in later years when the party found itself reliant on tiny Commons majorities. Heath himself considered his greatest success in office to be the United Kingdom's entry into the European Economic Community (or the "Common Market" as it was widely called at the time) but in subsequent years the UK's membership of the EEC was to prove the source of the greatest division in the party.
The country suffered a further bout of inflation in 1973 as a result of the OPEC
cartel raising oil prices, and this in turn led to renewed demands for wage increases in the coal industry. The government refused to accede to the miner's demands, resulting in a series of stoppages and massive attempts to ration power, including the "Three Day Week". Heath decided to call a snap election on the question of "Who Governs Britain?". However the Conservative Party was unprepared, whilst the miners' unions stated that they did not see how the re-election of the government would change the situation. The Conservatives were further rocked by the death of Iain Macleod
and the resignation of Enoch Powell
, who denounced the government for taking the country into the EEC and called on voters to back the Labour Party, who had promised a referendum
on withdrawal. The February 1974 election
produced an unusual result as support for the Liberals, Scottish National Party
and Plaid Cymru
all surged, Northern Ireland
's politics became more localised, whilst the Conservatives won a plurality of votes but Labour had a plurality of seats. With a hung Parliament
elected and the Ulster Unionists refusing to support the Conservative party, Heath tried to negotiate with the Liberals to form a coalition, but the attempts foundered on demands that were not acceptable to both parties. Heath was forced to resign as Prime Minister.
These years were seen as the height of "consensus politics". However, by the 1970s many traditional methods of running the economy, managing relations with trade unions, and so on began to fail—or had outright already failed. This was also a period of Labour-Party ascendancy, as they ruled for nearly twelve out of the fifteen years between 1964 and 1979. Many in the Conservative Party were left wondering how to proceed.
Heath remained leader of the party despite growing challenges to his mandate. At the time there was no system for challenging an incumbent, leader but after renewed pressure and a second general election defeat
a system was put in place and Heath agreed to holding a leadership election
to allow him to renew his mandate. Few both inside and out of the party expected him to be seriously challenged, let alone defeated. However Margaret Thatcher
stood against Heath and in a shock result outpolled him on the first ballot, leading him to withdraw from the contest. Thatcher then faced off four other candidates to become the first woman to lead a major British political party. Thatcher had much support from the monetarists
, led by Keith Joseph
. The Conservatives capitalised on the Winter of Discontent
and the growing inflation rate, not to mention the humiliating bailout of the UK economy by the IMF
in 1976, and won the 1979 general election
with a majority of 43. Thatcher, thereby became the UK's first woman Prime Minister.
Thatcher soon introduced controversial and difficult, but ultimately successful, economic reforms after two decades of decline. The Falklands War
, the perceived extreme left
nature of the Labour Party, and the intervention of the centrist SDP-Liberal Alliance
all contributed to her party winning the 1983 general election
in a landslide, gaining a majority of 144. Thatcher won the 1987 general election
with another large, but reduced majority of 102.
The second and third terms were dominated by privatisations of Britain's many state-owned industries, including British Telecom in 1984, the bus companies in 1985, British Gas
in 1986, British Airways
in 1987, British Leyland, and British Steel
in 1988. In 1984 Mrs. Thatcher also successfully concluded five-year long negotiations over Britain's budget to the European Economic Community. (See UK rebate
.)
In 1989, the Community Charge
(frequently referred to as the "poll tax
") was introduced to replace the ancient system of rates (based on property values) which funded local government. This unpopular new charge was a flat rate per adult no matter what their circumstances; it seemed to be shifting the tax burden disproportionately onto the poor. Once again Thatcher's popularity sagged, but this time the Conservatives thought it might cost them the election. Michael Heseltine
, a former cabinet member, challenged her for the leadership in 1990
. She won the first round, but not enough to win outright, and after taking soundings from cabinet members, she announced her intention not to contest the second ballot. In the ensuing second ballot, the Chancellor of the Exchequer
John Major
beat Heseltine and Douglas Hurd
.
Major introduced a replacement for the Community Charge, the Council Tax
, and continued with the privatisations, and went on to narrowly win the 1992 election
with a majority of 21.
Major's government was beset by scandals, crisis, and missteps. Many of the scandals were about the personal lives of politicians which the media construed as hypocrisy, but the Cash for Questions affair and the divisions over EU
were substantive. In 1995, Major resigned as Leader of the Conservative Party in order to trigger a leadership election
which he hoped would give him a renewed mandate, and quieten the Maastricht rebels (e.g. Iain Duncan Smith
, Bill Cash, Bernard Jenkin
). John Redwood
, then Secretary of State for Wales, stood against Major and gained around a fifth of the leadership vote. He was one of the people whom Major inadvertently referred to as 'bastards' during a television interview. Major was pleased that Michael Heseltine
had not stood against him and gave him the position of Deputy Prime Minister
as a result.
As the term went on, with by-elections being consistently lost by the Conservatives, their majority declined and eventually vanished entirely. Getting every vote out became increasingly important to both sides, and on several occasions ill MPs were wheeled into the Commons
to vote. Eventually, the Government became a technical minority.
As predicted, the general election of May 1997
was a win for the Labour Party, but the magnitude of the victory surprised almost everyone. There was a swing of 20% in some places, and Labour achieved a majority of 179 with 43% of the vote to the Conservatives' 31%. Tactical voting
against the Conservatives is believed to have caused around 40 seats to change hands. They lost all their seats outside of England, with prominent members such as Michael Portillo
and Malcolm Rifkind
among the losses. Major resigned within 24 hours.
It is often said that the Conservatives lost the 1997 election due to EU party-policy divisions. However, it is likely that the European question played only a small or insignificant part in the result. Accusations of "Tory sleaze", apathy towards a government that had been in power for nearly two decades, and a rebranded "New" Labour Party with a dynamic and charismatic leader (Tony Blair
) are all probable factors in the Conservative defeat.
and hypocrisy
. In particular the successful entrapment of Graham Riddick
and David Tredinnick
in the "cash for questions" scandal, the contemporaneous misconduct as a minister by Neil Hamilton
(who lost a consequent libel action against The Guardian), and the convictions of former Cabinet member Jonathan Aitken
and former party deputy chairman Jeffrey Archer for perjury
in two separate cases leading to custodial sentences damaged the Conservatives' public reputation. Persistent unsubstantiated rumours about the activities of the party treasurer Michael Ashcroft did not help this impression.
At the same time a series of revelations about the private lives of various Conservative politicians also grabbed the headlines and both the media and the party's opponents made little attempt to clarify the distinction between financial conduct and private lives.
John Major
's "Back to Basics
" morality campaign back-fired on him by providing an excuse for the British media to expose "sleaze" within the Conservative Party and, most damagingly, within the Cabinet itself. A number of ministers were then revealed to have committed sexual indiscretions, and Major was forced by media pressure to dismiss them. In September 2002 it was revealed that, prior to his promotion to the cabinet, Major had himself had a longstanding extramarital affair with a fellow MP, Edwina Currie
.
was contested by five candidates. The electorate for the contest consisted solely of the 165 Conservative MPs who had been returned to the House of Commons. The candidates were Kenneth Clarke
, William Hague
, John Redwood
, Peter Lilley
and Michael Howard
, with Stephen Dorrell
launching an initial bid but withdrawing before polling began, citing limited support, and backing Clarke. Clarke was the favoured candidate of the Europhile
left of the party, while the three latter candidates divided right-wing support roughly equally. Hague, who had initially supported Howard, emerged second as a compromise candidate and won the final ballot after Redwood and Clarke negotiated a joint ticket which was derided as an Instability Pact by their opponents (punning on the economic Stability Pact of the European Community).
At first William Hague portrayed himself as a moderniser with a common touch. However by the time the 2001 general election
came he concentrated on Europe, asylum seekers and tax cuts whilst declaring that only the Conservative Party could "Save the Pound". Though a master debater who would regularly trounce Tony Blair in the Commons, his leadership tenure was beset by poor publicity and stumbles. Despite a low turnout, the election resulted in a net gain of a single seat for the Conservative Party and William Hague's resignation as party leader.
was conducted under a new leadership electoral system designed by Hague. This resulted in five candidates competing for the job: Michael Portillo
, Iain Duncan Smith
, Kenneth Clarke
, David Davis
and Michael Ancram
. The drawn-out and at times acrimonious election saw Conservative MPs select Iain Duncan Smith and Ken Clarke to be put forward for a vote by party members. As Conservative Party members are characteristically Eurosceptic, Iain Duncan Smith was elected, even though opinion polls showed that the public preferred Ken Clarke, a member of the Tory Reform Group
. (Main article: 2001 Conservative leadership election.)
Iain Duncan Smith (often known as IDS) was a strong Eurosceptic
but this did not define his leadership - indeed it was during his tenure that Europe ceased to be an issue of division in the party as it united behind calls for a referendum on the proposed European Union Constitution. Duncan Smith's Shadow Cabinet
contained many new and unfamiliar faces but despite predictions by some that the party would lurch to the right the team instead followed a pragmatic moderate approach to policy.
On 27 October Iain Duncan Smith began to face calls within his own party to either resign as leader or face a vote of confidence. Under the rules of the Conservative party, the backbench Conservative 1922 Committee would review the leadership, and in order for this to take place the chairman of the committee, Sir Michael Spicer must be presented with 25 letters proposing a vote.
On 28 October sufficient letters were presented to the chairman of the 1922 Committee to initiate a vote of confidence in Iain Duncan Smith. The vote came on 29 October, and IDS lost 90 to 75.
, MP
for Folkestone
and Hythe
, was elected to the post of leader
(as the only candidate) on 6 November 2003.
Howard announced radical changes to the way the Shadow Cabinet
would work. He slashed the number of members by half, with Theresa May
and Tim Yeo
each shadowing two government departments. Minor departments still have shadows but have been removed from the cabinet, and the post of Shadow Leader of the House of Commons
was abolished. The role of party chairman was also split into two, with Lord Saatchi responsible for the party machine, and Liam Fox
handling publicity. Michael Portillo
was offered a position but refused, due to his plans to step down from Parliament at the next election.
Also, a panel of "grandees", including John Major
, Iain Duncan Smith
, William Hague
and, notably, Kenneth Clarke
has been set up to advise the leadership as they see fit.
On 2 January 2004, influenced by Saatchi, Howard defined a personal credo and list of core beliefs of the party. At the party conference of October 2004, the Conservatives presented their "Timetable For Action
" that a Conservative government would follow.
In the 2005 general election, the Conservative Party made a partial recovery by a net gain of 31 seats, with the Labour majority falling to 66.
The day after, on 6 May, Howard announced that he believed himself too old to lead the party into another election campaign, and he would therefore be stepping down to allow a new leader the time to prepare for the next election. Howard said that he believed that the party needed to amend the rules governing the election of the Party leader, and that he would allow time for that to happen before resigning. See Conservative Party (UK) leadership election, 2005
The 2005 campaign received criticism from its main financial backer, Michael Spencer
. In an interview with The Times
Tim Collins
claimed that the specific reasons the party won more seats may not repeat themselves in the next general election::
won the subsequent leadership campaign on 6 December 2005. Cameron beat his closest rival David Davis
by a margin of more than two to one, taking 134,446 votes to 64,398, and announced his intention to reform and realign the Conservative Party in a manner similar to that achieved by the Labour Party in opposition under Tony Blair. As part of this he distanced from himself from the much hated Conservative Party of the past, for example apologising for Section 28
, and focused in on modern environmental issues.
In April 2006 the party set out to deliver a promise by Cameron to modernize its parliamentary representation. A central candidates' committee reduced some five hundred aspiring politicians on the party's list of approved parliamentary candidates to an "A-list" of between 100 and 150 priority candidates. More than half of the names on the resulting list proved to be female, and several were of non-Establishment figures of various kinds.
After the party had led in opinion poll
s for most of Cameron's time in office, a hung parliament
was achieved in the 2010 General Election, with the Conservatives achieving the most votes and largest number of seats in parliament. This outcome had been widely predicted and was largely due to a surge in support for the Liberal Democrats. Cameron successfully negotiated with the Liberal Democrats
on forming a coalition government
.
Conservative Party (UK)
The Conservative Party, formally the Conservative and Unionist Party, is a centre-right political party in the United Kingdom that adheres to the philosophies of conservatism and British unionism. It is the largest political party in the UK, and is currently the largest single party in the House...
of the United Kingdom
United Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...
, also known as the Unionist Party in the early 20th century, traces its origins back to the "Tory" supporters of Duke of York
James II of England
James II & VII was King of England and King of Ireland as James II and King of Scotland as James VII, from 6 February 1685. He was the last Catholic monarch to reign over the Kingdoms of England, Scotland, and Ireland...
, later King James VII&II, during the 1678-1681 exclusion. The name was originally meant as a pejorative—a 'Tory' was a type of Irish bandit.
The name 'Conservative' was suggested by John Wilson Croker
John Wilson Croker
John Wilson Croker was an Irish statesman and author.He was born at Galway, the only son of John Croker, the surveyor-general of customs and excise in Ireland. He was educated at Trinity College, Dublin, where he graduated in 1800...
in the 1830s and later officially adopted, but the party is still often referred to as the 'Tory Party' (not least because newspaper editors find it a convenient shorthand when space is limited). The Tories more often than not formed the government
Government
Government refers to the legislators, administrators, and arbitrators in the administrative bureaucracy who control a state at a given time, and to the system of government by which they are organized...
from the accession of King George III
George III of the United Kingdom
George III was King of Great Britain and King of Ireland from 25 October 1760 until the union of these two countries on 1 January 1801, after which he was King of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland until his death...
(in 1760) until the Reform Act 1832
Reform Act 1832
The Representation of the People Act 1832 was an Act of Parliament that introduced wide-ranging changes to the electoral system of England and Wales...
.
Widening of the franchise in the 19th century led the party to popularise its approach, especially under Benjamin Disraeli, his own Reform Act
Reform Act 1867
The Representation of the People Act 1867, 30 & 31 Vict. c. 102 was a piece of British legislation that enfranchised the urban male working class in England and Wales....
coming in 1867. After 1886, the Conservatives allied with the part of the Liberal Party
Liberal Party (UK)
The Liberal Party was one of the two major political parties of the United Kingdom during the 19th and early 20th centuries. It was a third party of negligible importance throughout the latter half of the 20th Century, before merging with the Social Democratic Party in 1988 to form the present day...
known as the Liberal Unionists who opposed their party's support for Irish Home Rule and held office for all but three of the following twenty years. During this period the party was generally known as the Unionist Party, and it suffered a large defeat when the party split over tariff reform in 1906.
World War I
World War I
World War I , which was predominantly called the World War or the Great War from its occurrence until 1939, and the First World War or World War I thereafter, was a major war centred in Europe that began on 28 July 1914 and lasted until 11 November 1918...
saw an all-party coalition, and for four years after the armistice the party remained in coalition with the Lloyd George Liberals. Eventually, grassroots pressure forced the breakup of the Coalition, and the party regained power on its own. It again dominated the political scene in the inter-war period, from 1931 in a 'National Government
UK National Government
In the United Kingdom the term National Government is an abstract concept referring to a coalition of some or all major political parties. In a historical sense it usually refers primarily to the governments of Ramsay MacDonald, Stanley Baldwin and Neville Chamberlain which held office from 1931...
' coalition. However in the 1945 general election
United Kingdom general election, 1945
The United Kingdom general election of 1945 was a general election held on 5 July 1945, with polls in some constituencies delayed until 12 July and in Nelson and Colne until 19 July, due to local wakes weeks. The results were counted and declared on 26 July, due in part to the time it took to...
the party lost power in a landslide to the Labour Party
Labour Party (UK)
The Labour Party is a centre-left democratic socialist party in the United Kingdom. It surpassed the Liberal Party in general elections during the early 1920s, forming minority governments under Ramsay MacDonald in 1924 and 1929-1931. The party was in a wartime coalition from 1940 to 1945, after...
.
After the end of the Second World War
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
, the Conservatives accepted the reality of the Labour government's nationalisation programme, the creation of the 'welfare state', and the high taxes required for all of it. But when they returned to power in 1951 the party oversaw an economic boom and ever-increasing national prosperity throughout the 1950s. The party stumbled in the 1960s and 1970s, but in 1975 Margaret Thatcher became leader and converted it to a monetarist economic programme; after her election victory in 1979 her government became known for its free market
Free market
A free market is a competitive market where prices are determined by supply and demand. However, the term is also commonly used for markets in which economic intervention and regulation by the state is limited to tax collection, and enforcement of private ownership and contracts...
approach to problems and privatisation of public utilities. Here, the Conservatives experienced a high-point, Thatcher leading the Conservatives to two more landslide election victories in 1983 and 1987.
However, towards the end of the 1980s, Thatcher's increasing unpopularity and unwillingness to change policies perceived as vote-losing led to her being deposed in 1990 and replaced by John Major
John Major
Sir John Major, is a British Conservative politician, who served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom and Leader of the Conservative Party from 1990–1997...
who won an unexpected election victory in 1992. Major's government suffered a political blow when the Pound Sterling
Pound sterling
The pound sterling , commonly called the pound, is the official currency of the United Kingdom, its Crown Dependencies and the British Overseas Territories of South Georgia and the South Sandwich Islands, British Antarctic Territory and Tristan da Cunha. It is subdivided into 100 pence...
was forced out of the Exchange Rate Mechanism
Black Wednesday
In politics and economics, Black Wednesday refers to the events of 16 September 1992 when the British Conservative government was forced to withdraw the pound sterling from the European Exchange Rate Mechanism after they were unable to keep it above its agreed lower limit...
later that year, which lost the party much of its reputation for good financial stewardship. Although the country's economy recovered in the mid-1990s, an effective opposition campaign by the Labour Party led to a landslide defeat in 1997.
Origins
The modern Conservative Party arose in the 1830s, but has as an ancestor the Tory parties of the seventeenth, eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. Political alignments in those centuries were much looser than now, with many individual groupings. From the 1780s until the 1820s the dominant grouping were those Whigs following William Pitt the YoungerWilliam Pitt the Younger
William Pitt the Younger was a British politician of the late 18th and early 19th centuries. He became the youngest Prime Minister in 1783 at the age of 24 . He left office in 1801, but was Prime Minister again from 1804 until his death in 1806...
and his successors, who gradually came to be called Tories. In the late 1820s disputes over political reform broke up this grouping. A government led by the Duke of Wellington
Arthur Wellesley, 1st Duke of Wellington
Field Marshal Arthur Wellesley, 1st Duke of Wellington, KG, GCB, GCH, PC, FRS , was an Irish-born British soldier and statesman, and one of the leading military and political figures of the 19th century...
collapsed amidst dire election results. Following this disaster Robert Peel
Robert Peel
Sir Robert Peel, 2nd Baronet was a British Conservative statesman who served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 10 December 1834 to 8 April 1835, and again from 30 August 1841 to 29 June 1846...
set about assembling a new coalition of forces. Peel issued the Tamworth Manifesto
Tamworth Manifesto
The Tamworth Manifesto was a political manifesto issued by Sir Robert Peel in 1834 in Tamworth, which is widely credited by historians as having laid down the principles upon which the modern British Conservative Party is based....
in 1834 which set out the basic principles of Conservatism
Conservatism
Conservatism is a political and social philosophy that promotes the maintenance of traditional institutions and supports, at the most, minimal and gradual change in society. Some conservatives seek to preserve things as they are, emphasizing stability and continuity, while others oppose modernism...
and that year he formed a temporary government. On the fall of Lord Melbourne
William Lamb, 2nd Viscount Melbourne
William Lamb, 2nd Viscount Melbourne, PC, FRS was a British Whig statesman who served as Home Secretary and Prime Minister . He is best known for his intense and successful mentoring of Queen Victoria, at ages 18-21, in the ways of politics...
's government in 1841 Peel took office with a substantial majority and appeared set for a long rule.
Crisis over the Corn Laws
However in 1846 disaster struck when the party split over the repeal of the Corn LawsCorn Laws
The Corn Laws were trade barriers designed to protect cereal producers in the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland against competition from less expensive foreign imports between 1815 and 1846. The barriers were introduced by the Importation Act 1815 and repealed by the Importation Act 1846...
. Peel and most senior Conservatives favoured repeal, but they were opposed by backbench members representing farming and rural constituencies, led by Lord George Bentinck
Lord George Bentinck
Lord George Frederick Cavendish-Scott-Bentinck , better known as simply Lord George Bentinck, was an English Conservative politician and racehorse owner, best known for his role in unseating Sir Robert Peel over the Corn Laws.Bentinck was a younger son of the 4th Duke of Portland, and elected a...
, Benjamin Disraeli
Benjamin Disraeli, 1st Earl of Beaconsfield
Benjamin Disraeli, 1st Earl of Beaconsfield, KG, PC, FRS, was a British Prime Minister, parliamentarian, Conservative statesman and literary figure. Starting from comparatively humble origins, he served in government for three decades, twice as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom...
, and Lord Stanley
Edward Smith-Stanley, 14th Earl of Derby
Edward George Geoffrey Smith-Stanley, 14th Earl of Derby, KG, PC was an English statesman, three times Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, and to date the longest serving leader of the Conservative Party. He was known before 1834 as Edward Stanley, and from 1834 to 1851 as Lord Stanley...
(later the Earl of Derby), who favoured protectionism
Protectionism
Protectionism is the economic policy of restraining trade between states through methods such as tariffs on imported goods, restrictive quotas, and a variety of other government regulations designed to allow "fair competition" between imports and goods and services produced domestically.This...
. Following repeal, the Protectionists combined with the Whigs to overthrow Peel's government. It would be twenty-eight years before a Conservative Prime Minister again had a majority in the House of Commons.
From this point on, and especially after the death of Peel in 1850, the Peelites and Conservatives drifted apart. Most of the Peelites joined with the Whigs and Radicals to form the Liberal Party
Liberal Party (UK)
The Liberal Party was one of the two major political parties of the United Kingdom during the 19th and early 20th centuries. It was a third party of negligible importance throughout the latter half of the 20th Century, before merging with the Social Democratic Party in 1988 to form the present day...
in 1859, under the leadership of Lord Palmerston
Henry Temple, 3rd Viscount Palmerston
Henry John Temple, 3rd Viscount Palmerston, KG, GCB, PC , known popularly as Lord Palmerston, was a British statesman who served twice as Prime Minister in the mid-19th century...
.
Recovery and triumph under Derby and Disraeli
The Conservatives survived as an independent party, even though they would not form another majority government until the 1870s. The modern Conservative Party descends from the Protectionists who broke with Peel in 1846, although they did not reintroduce Protection when they were returned to power. Under the leadership of Derby and Disraeli they consolidated their position and slowly rebuilt the strength of the party. Although Derby led several minority governments in the 1850s and 1860s, the party could not achieve a majority until 1874, after the passage of the Reform Act of 1867Reform Act 1867
The Representation of the People Act 1867, 30 & 31 Vict. c. 102 was a piece of British legislation that enfranchised the urban male working class in England and Wales....
, which broadened the franchise. Disraeli's mixed message of patriotism and promises of social reforms managed to win him enough working-class support to win a majority in 1874
United Kingdom general election, 1874
-Seats summary:-References:* F. W. S. Craig, British Electoral Facts: 1832-1987* British Electoral Facts 1832-1999, compiled and edited by Colin Rallings and Michael Thrasher *...
, but the Conservative hold remained tenuous, and Disraeli was defeated in the election of 1880
United Kingdom general election, 1880
-Seats summary:-References:*F. W. S. Craig, British Electoral Facts: 1832-1987* British Electoral Facts 1832-1999, compiled and edited by Colin Rallings and Michael Thrasher *...
. It was not until the split in the Liberal Party
Liberal Party (UK)
The Liberal Party was one of the two major political parties of the United Kingdom during the 19th and early 20th centuries. It was a third party of negligible importance throughout the latter half of the 20th Century, before merging with the Social Democratic Party in 1988 to form the present day...
over Irish home rule in 1886 that the Conservatives were able to achieve truly secure majorities through the defection of the Liberal Unionists
Liberal Unionist Party
The Liberal Unionist Party was a British political party that was formed in 1886 by a faction that broke away from the Liberal Party. Led by Lord Hartington and Joseph Chamberlain, the party formed a political alliance with the Conservative Party in opposition to Irish Home Rule...
.
The Unionist Ascendancy
The Conservatives, now led by Lord Salisbury, remained in power for most of the next twenty years, at first passively supported by the Liberal Unionists and then, after 1895, in active coalition with them. From 1895, unofficially, and after 1912 officially, the Conservative-Liberal Unionist coalition was often simply called the "Unionists". In 1902 Salisbury retired and his nephew Arthur BalfourArthur Balfour
Arthur James Balfour, 1st Earl of Balfour, KG, OM, PC, DL was a British Conservative politician and statesman...
became Prime Minister.
The party then split on the issue of Tariff Reform. The controversy had been taken up by the Liberal Unionist cabinet minister Joseph Chamberlain
Joseph Chamberlain
Joseph Chamberlain was an influential British politician and statesman. Unlike most major politicians of the time, he was a self-made businessman and had not attended Oxford or Cambridge University....
, who was Colonial Secretary
Secretary of State for the Colonies
The Secretary of State for the Colonies or Colonial Secretary was the British Cabinet minister in charge of managing the United Kingdom's various colonial dependencies....
. Like the earlier schism over the Corn Laws
Corn Laws
The Corn Laws were trade barriers designed to protect cereal producers in the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland against competition from less expensive foreign imports between 1815 and 1846. The barriers were introduced by the Importation Act 1815 and repealed by the Importation Act 1846...
in 1846, the result lead to polarisation within the coalition between those who supported Chamberlain and his 'Imperial Preference', and those who opposed him in defence of the status quo and Free Trade
Free trade
Under a free trade policy, prices emerge from supply and demand, and are the sole determinant of resource allocation. 'Free' trade differs from other forms of trade policy where the allocation of goods and services among trading countries are determined by price strategies that may differ from...
. The split went across both Unionist parties. With the beleaguered Balfour in the middle, the government struggled on for another two years and saw many Unionist MPs defect to the Liberals. These defectors included the future Conservative party leader Winston Churchill
Winston Churchill
Sir Winston Leonard Spencer-Churchill, was a predominantly Conservative British politician and statesman known for his leadership of the United Kingdom during the Second World War. He is widely regarded as one of the greatest wartime leaders of the century and served as Prime Minister twice...
in 1904.
Early twentieth century
The election of 1906United Kingdom general election, 1906
-Seats summary:-See also:*MPs elected in the United Kingdom general election, 1906*The Parliamentary Franchise in the United Kingdom 1885-1918-External links:***-References:*F. W. S. Craig, British Electoral Facts: 1832-1987**...
ended in a landslide defeat for the Unionists and their numbers were reduced to only 157 MPs. The Unionists had been suffering as a result of the unpopular Boer War
Boer War
The Boer Wars were two wars fought between the British Empire and the two independent Boer republics, the Oranje Vrijstaat and the Republiek van Transvaal ....
, (known as Joe's War, a particular link to Joseph Chamberlain) as well as the unpopular tariff reforms proposed by Chamberlain, which faced the growing popularity of free trade
Free trade
Under a free trade policy, prices emerge from supply and demand, and are the sole determinant of resource allocation. 'Free' trade differs from other forms of trade policy where the allocation of goods and services among trading countries are determined by price strategies that may differ from...
amongst the population. Chamberlain himself was told to keep his "hands off the peoples food!" Balfour lost his own seat (although he soon returned to Parliament in a by-election) and this left the pro-tariff reformers within the Unionists as a large majority. However, the stroke suffered by Joseph Chamberlain in July 1906 effectively removed him from political influence. The cause of Tariff reform would now be promoted by Chamberlain's son Austen Chamberlain
Austen Chamberlain
Sir Joseph Austen Chamberlain, KG was a British statesman, recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize and half-brother of Neville Chamberlain.- Early life and career :...
.
The Unionists strongly opposed many of the proposed reforms of the new Liberal governments of Campbell-Bannerman
Henry Campbell-Bannerman
Sir Henry Campbell-Bannerman GCB was a British Liberal Party politician who served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 1905 to 1908 and Leader of the Liberal Party from 1899 to 1908. He also served as Secretary of State for War twice, in the Cabinets of Gladstone and Rosebery...
and Asquith. In 1910, the Unionist-dominated House of Lords
House of Lords
The House of Lords is the upper house of the Parliament of the United Kingdom. Like the House of Commons, it meets in the Palace of Westminster....
rejected the so-called "People's Budget
People's Budget
The 1909 People's Budget was a product of then British Prime Minister H. H. Asquith's Liberal government, introducing many unprecedented taxes on the wealthy and radical social welfare programmes to Britain's political life...
", leading to a long conflict over the nature and constitutional place of the House of Lords. The Conservatives managed to make up much of their losses in both the January and December elections of 1910. This forced the Liberals to rely on Irish Nationalist votes to maintain their majority. Although the Liberals were able to force through the effective subjugation of the Lords with the Parliament Act 1911
Parliament Act 1911
The Parliament Act 1911 is an Act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom. It is constitutionally important and partly governs the relationship between the House of Commons and the House of Lords which make up the Houses of Parliament. This Act must be construed as one with the Parliament Act 1949...
, their advocacy once again cost them support, so that by the time of the outbreak of World War I
World War I
World War I , which was predominantly called the World War or the Great War from its occurrence until 1939, and the First World War or World War I thereafter, was a major war centred in Europe that began on 28 July 1914 and lasted until 11 November 1918...
a Unionist victory in the next election looked possible. Liberal mismanagement of the early phases World War I led to the return of the Unionists to power: first in coalition with Asquith's Liberals, and then, with the split and collapse of the Liberals, the Unionists under Andrew Bonar Law were able to become the dominant party in Lloyd George's
David Lloyd George
David Lloyd George, 1st Earl Lloyd-George of Dwyfor OM, PC was a British Liberal politician and statesman...
coalition government following the 1918 election
United Kingdom general election, 1918
The United Kingdom general election of 1918 was the first to be held after the Representation of the People Act 1918, which meant it was the first United Kingdom general election in which nearly all adult men and some women could vote. Polling was held on 14 December 1918, although the count did...
.
The Baldwin era
Soviet Union
The Soviet Union , officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics , was a constitutionally socialist state that existed in Eurasia between 1922 and 1991....
, trade unions and the Irish issue (leading to the de facto independence for the Irish Free State
Irish Free State
The Irish Free State was the state established as a Dominion on 6 December 1922 under the Anglo-Irish Treaty, signed by the British government and Irish representatives exactly twelve months beforehand...
in 1921 led to many Conservatives hoping to break with Lloyd George. Bonar Law resigned in 1921 on the grounds of ill health and the parliamentary party was now led by Austen Chamberlain
Austen Chamberlain
Sir Joseph Austen Chamberlain, KG was a British statesman, recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize and half-brother of Neville Chamberlain.- Early life and career :...
. Previously a contender for party leadership in 1911, Chamberlain was to prove ineffective in controlling his party—even passing up the offer of becoming Prime Minister when Lloyd George indicated he was willing to step down. The party eventually broke free from Lloyd George in October 1922 as the result of a meeting of MPs at the Carlton Club
Carlton Club
The Carlton Club is a gentlemen's club in London which describes itself as the "oldest, most elite, and most important of all Conservative clubs." Membership of the club is by nomination and election only.-History:...
. They voted against remaining in the coalition and Chamberlain resigned. He was actually replaced by Bonar Law, who had been persuaded by friends and allies to return to lead the party.
After winning the election of 1922
United Kingdom general election, 1922
The United Kingdom general election of 1922 was held on 15 November 1922. It was the first election held after most of the Irish counties left the United Kingdom to form the Irish Free State, and was won by Andrew Bonar Law's Conservatives, who gained an overall majority over Labour, led by John...
, Bonar Law, now terminally ill with throat cancer, was to resign for good from political life in May 1923. He died later that year. Though holding a majority in government, the party was still split, as many of those who stayed to the bitter end of the former coalition had refused to take office in Law's cabinet. Their absence explains why the hitherto unknown Stanley Baldwin
Stanley Baldwin
Stanley Baldwin, 1st Earl Baldwin of Bewdley, KG, PC was a British Conservative politician, who dominated the government in his country between the two world wars...
was to become leader of the party barely two years after first entering a major ministerial post.
The party reached a new height in the inter-war years under Baldwin's leadership. His mixture of strong social reforms and steady government proved a powerful election combination, with the result that the Conservatives governed Britain either by themselves or as the leading component of the National Government
UK National Government
In the United Kingdom the term National Government is an abstract concept referring to a coalition of some or all major political parties. In a historical sense it usually refers primarily to the governments of Ramsay MacDonald, Stanley Baldwin and Neville Chamberlain which held office from 1931...
for most of the interwar years and all through World War II
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
. The Conservatives under Baldwin were also the last political party in Britain to gain over 50% of the vote (in the general election of 1931
United Kingdom general election, 1931
The United Kingdom general election on Tuesday 27 October 1931 was the last in the United Kingdom not held on a Thursday. It was also the last election, and the only one under universal suffrage, where one party received an absolute majority of the votes cast.The 1931 general election was the...
). Yet at the conclusion of hostilities, the British public felt a different party would best guide them through the peace, and the Conservatives were soundly defeated in the 1945 General Election
United Kingdom general election, 1945
The United Kingdom general election of 1945 was a general election held on 5 July 1945, with polls in some constituencies delayed until 12 July and in Nelson and Colne until 19 July, due to local wakes weeks. The results were counted and declared on 26 July, due in part to the time it took to...
by a resurgent Labour Party.
Post war recovery
The party responded to their defeat by accepting many of the LabourLabour Party (UK)
The Labour Party is a centre-left democratic socialist party in the United Kingdom. It surpassed the Liberal Party in general elections during the early 1920s, forming minority governments under Ramsay MacDonald in 1924 and 1929-1931. The party was in a wartime coalition from 1940 to 1945, after...
government's social reforms whilst also offering a distinctive Conservative edge, as set out in their 1947 poicy statement Industrial Charter
Industrial Charter
The Industrial Charter: A Statement of Conservative Industrial Policy was a 1947 pamphlet and policy statement by the United Kingdom Conservative Party in which the party reconciled itself with the radical social changes introduced by the Labour Party government following the United Kingdom general...
. They returned to government in 1951
United Kingdom general election, 1951
The 1951 United Kingdom general election was held eighteen months after the 1950 general election, which the Labour Party had won with a slim majority of just five seats...
under Churchill. Churchill remained leader for another four years, during which time the Conservatives showed their acceptance of Labour reforms, though modifying some, such as the denationalisation the steel industry. In 1955 Churchill retired and was succeeded by Sir Anthony Eden
Anthony Eden
Robert Anthony Eden, 1st Earl of Avon, KG, MC, PC was a British Conservative politician, who was Prime Minister from 1955 to 1957...
. Eden had an immense personal popularity and lengthy experience as Foreign Secretary, but his government ran into a number of troubles on the domestic front as the economy began to overheat. In international affairs the government was confronted by the decision of the Egypt
Egypt
Egypt , officially the Arab Republic of Egypt, Arabic: , is a country mainly in North Africa, with the Sinai Peninsula forming a land bridge in Southwest Asia. Egypt is thus a transcontinental country, and a major power in Africa, the Mediterranean Basin, the Middle East and the Muslim world...
ian government of Gamal Abdel Nasser
Gamal Abdel Nasser
Gamal Abdel Nasser Hussein was the second President of Egypt from 1956 until his death. A colonel in the Egyptian army, Nasser led the Egyptian Revolution of 1952 along with Muhammad Naguib, the first president, which overthrew the monarchy of Egypt and Sudan, and heralded a new period of...
to nationalise the Suez Canal
Suez Canal
The Suez Canal , also known by the nickname "The Highway to India", is an artificial sea-level waterway in Egypt, connecting the Mediterranean Sea and the Red Sea. Opened in November 1869 after 10 years of construction work, it allows water transportation between Europe and Asia without navigation...
. Eden agreed to a secret collaboration with France
France
The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...
and Israel
Israel
The State of Israel is a parliamentary republic located in the Middle East, along the eastern shore of the Mediterranean Sea...
to retake the Canal, but the resulting operation [see Suez Crisis
Suez Crisis
The Suez Crisis, also referred to as the Tripartite Aggression, Suez War was an offensive war fought by France, the United Kingdom, and Israel against Egypt beginning on 29 October 1956. Less than a day after Israel invaded Egypt, Britain and France issued a joint ultimatum to Egypt and Israel,...
] backfired miserably and left the United Kingdom heavily embarrassed abroad and Eden discredited at home. With his health failing, Eden resigned at the beginning of 1957.
The succession was contentious, with Rab Butler
Rab Butler
Richard Austen Butler, Baron Butler of Saffron Walden, KG CH DL PC , who invariably signed his name R. A. Butler and was familiarly known as Rab, was a British Conservative politician...
as the favourite to succeed. However, it was Harold Macmillan
Harold Macmillan
Maurice Harold Macmillan, 1st Earl of Stockton, OM, PC was Conservative Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 10 January 1957 to 18 October 1963....
who became the next Prime Minister and leader of the party. Macmillan sought to rebuild the government's image both at home and abroad, and presided over strong economic growth and a massive expansion in the consumer-product economy. In 1959 he won the general election of that year
United Kingdom general election, 1959
This United Kingdom general election was held on 8 October 1959. It marked a third successive victory for the ruling Conservative Party, led by Harold Macmillan...
on this economic success, summed up in the slogan "You've never had it so good." However, rising unemployment and an economic downturn in the early 1960s eroded support for Macmillan's government. It was further rocked in 1963 by the resignation of the Secretary of State for War John Profumo
John Profumo
Brigadier John Dennis Profumo, 5th Baron Profumo CBE , informally known as Jack Profumo , was a British politician. His title, 5th Baron, which he did not use, was Italian. Although Profumo held an increasingly responsible series of political posts in the 1950s, he is best known today for his...
over the Profumo Affair
Profumo Affair
The Profumo Affair was a 1963 British political scandal named after John Profumo, Secretary of State for War. His affair with Christine Keeler, the reputed mistress of an alleged Russian spy, followed by lying in the House of Commons when he was questioned about it, forced the resignation of...
. In October 1963 Macmillan was misdiagnosed with terminal cancer and resigned.
The party at this time lacked a formal process for electing a new leader and Macmillan's resignation took place in the week of the annual Conservative Party Conference. This event rapidly became an American-style convention as leading ministers sought to establish their credentials. Eventually Macmillan formally recommended to the Queen
Elizabeth II of the United Kingdom
Elizabeth II is the constitutional monarch of 16 sovereign states known as the Commonwealth realms: the United Kingdom, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Jamaica, Barbados, the Bahamas, Grenada, Papua New Guinea, the Solomon Islands, Tuvalu, Saint Lucia, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, Belize,...
that she appoint the Earl of Home
Alec Douglas-Home
Alexander Frederick Douglas-Home, Baron Home of the Hirsel, KT, PC , known as The Earl of Home from 1951 to 1963 and as Sir Alec Douglas-Home from 1963 to 1974, was a British Conservative politician who served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from October 1963 to October 1964.He is the last...
as Prime Minister. Home was appointed and renounced his peerage, becoming Sir Alec Douglas-Home, but was unable to restore the party's fortunes and narrowly lost the 1964 general election
United Kingdom general election, 1964
The United Kingdom general election of 1964 was held on 15 October 1964, more than five years after the preceding election, and thirteen years after the Conservative Party had retaken power...
.
The Heath years: 1965-1975
Conservative Party (UK) leadership election, 1965
The Conservative Party leadership election of July 1965 was held to find a successor to Sir Alec Douglas-Home.It was the first time that a formal election by the parliamentary party had taken place, previous leaders having emerged through a consultation process...
was won by Edward Heath
Edward Heath
Sir Edward Richard George "Ted" Heath, KG, MBE, PC was a British Conservative politician who served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom and as Leader of the Conservative Party ....
over both Reginald Maudling
Reginald Maudling
Reginald Maudling was a British politician who held several Cabinet posts, including Chancellor of the Exchequer. He had been spoken of as a prospective Conservative leader since 1955, and was twice seriously considered for the post; he was Edward Heath's chief rival in 1965...
and Enoch Powell
Enoch Powell
John Enoch Powell, MBE was a British politician, classical scholar, poet, writer, and soldier. He served as a Conservative Party MP and Minister of Health . He attained most prominence in 1968, when he made the controversial Rivers of Blood speech in opposition to mass immigration from...
. The party proceeded to lose the 1966 general election
United Kingdom general election, 1966
The 1966 United Kingdom general election on 31 March 1966 was called by sitting Labour Prime Minister Harold Wilson. Wilson's decision to call an election turned on the fact that his government, elected a mere 17 months previously in 1964 had an unworkably small majority of only 4 MPs...
. Heath's leadership proved controversial, with frequent calls from many prominent party members and supporters for him to step down, but he persevered. To the shock of almost everyone bar Heath, the party won the 1970 general election
United Kingdom general election, 1970
The United Kingdom general election of 1970 was held on 18 June 1970, and resulted in a surprise victory for the Conservative Party under leader Edward Heath, who defeated the Labour Party under Harold Wilson. The election also saw the Liberal Party and its new leader Jeremy Thorpe lose half their...
.
As with all British governments in this period, Heath's time in office was difficult. Furthermore, the Heath premiership remains one of the most controversial in the history of the party. Initial attempts to follow monetarist policies (later considered "Thatcherite") failed, with high inflation and unemployment blocking Heath's attempts at reforming the increasingly militant trade unions. The era of 1970s British industrial unrest had arrived.
The Troubles
The Troubles
The Troubles was a period of ethno-political conflict in Northern Ireland which spilled over at various times into England, the Republic of Ireland, and mainland Europe. The duration of the Troubles is conventionally dated from the late 1960s and considered by many to have ended with the Belfast...
in Northern Ireland would lead Heath to suspending the Parliament of Northern Ireland
Parliament of Northern Ireland
The Parliament of Northern Ireland was the home rule legislature of Northern Ireland, created under the Government of Ireland Act 1920, which sat from 7 June 1921 to 30 March 1972, when it was suspended...
and introducing direct rule
Direct Rule
Direct rule was the term given, during the late 20th and early 21st centuries, to the administration of Northern Ireland directly from Westminster, seat of United Kingdom government...
as a precursor to establishing a power-sharing executive under the Sunningdale Agreement
Sunningdale Agreement
The Sunningdale Agreement was an attempt to establish a power-sharing Northern Ireland Executive and a cross-border Council of Ireland. The Agreement was signed at the Civil Service College in Sunningdale Park located in Sunningdale, Berkshire, on 9 December 1973.Unionist opposition, violence and...
. This resulted in the Conservative Party losing the support of the Ulster Unionist Party
Ulster Unionist Party
The Ulster Unionist Party – sometimes referred to as the Official Unionist Party or, in a historic sense, simply the Unionist Party – is the more moderate of the two main unionist political parties in Northern Ireland...
at Westminster, which was to have consequences in later years when the party found itself reliant on tiny Commons majorities. Heath himself considered his greatest success in office to be the United Kingdom's entry into the European Economic Community (or the "Common Market" as it was widely called at the time) but in subsequent years the UK's membership of the EEC was to prove the source of the greatest division in the party.
The country suffered a further bout of inflation in 1973 as a result of the OPEC
OPEC
OPEC is an intergovernmental organization of twelve developing countries made up of Algeria, Angola, Ecuador, Iran, Iraq, Kuwait, Libya, Nigeria, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, and Venezuela. OPEC has maintained its headquarters in Vienna since 1965, and hosts regular meetings...
cartel raising oil prices, and this in turn led to renewed demands for wage increases in the coal industry. The government refused to accede to the miner's demands, resulting in a series of stoppages and massive attempts to ration power, including the "Three Day Week". Heath decided to call a snap election on the question of "Who Governs Britain?". However the Conservative Party was unprepared, whilst the miners' unions stated that they did not see how the re-election of the government would change the situation. The Conservatives were further rocked by the death of Iain Macleod
Iain Macleod
Iain Norman Macleod was a British Conservative Party politician and government minister.-Early life:...
and the resignation of Enoch Powell
Enoch Powell
John Enoch Powell, MBE was a British politician, classical scholar, poet, writer, and soldier. He served as a Conservative Party MP and Minister of Health . He attained most prominence in 1968, when he made the controversial Rivers of Blood speech in opposition to mass immigration from...
, who denounced the government for taking the country into the EEC and called on voters to back the Labour Party, who had promised a referendum
Referendum
A referendum is a direct vote in which an entire electorate is asked to either accept or reject a particular proposal. This may result in the adoption of a new constitution, a constitutional amendment, a law, the recall of an elected official or simply a specific government policy. It is a form of...
on withdrawal. The February 1974 election
United Kingdom general election, February 1974
The United Kingdom's general election of February 1974 was held on the 28th of that month. It was the first of two United Kingdom general elections held that year, and the first election since the Second World War not to produce an overall majority in the House of Commons for the winning party,...
produced an unusual result as support for the Liberals, Scottish National Party
Scottish National Party
The Scottish National Party is a social-democratic political party in Scotland which campaigns for Scottish independence from the United Kingdom....
and Plaid Cymru
Plaid Cymru
' is a political party in Wales. It advocates the establishment of an independent Welsh state within the European Union. was formed in 1925 and won its first seat in 1966...
all surged, Northern Ireland
Northern Ireland
Northern Ireland is one of the four countries of the United Kingdom. Situated in the north-east of the island of Ireland, it shares a border with the Republic of Ireland to the south and west...
's politics became more localised, whilst the Conservatives won a plurality of votes but Labour had a plurality of seats. With a hung Parliament
Hung parliament
In a two-party parliamentary system of government, a hung parliament occurs when neither major political party has an absolute majority of seats in the parliament . It is also less commonly known as a balanced parliament or a legislature under no overall control...
elected and the Ulster Unionists refusing to support the Conservative party, Heath tried to negotiate with the Liberals to form a coalition, but the attempts foundered on demands that were not acceptable to both parties. Heath was forced to resign as Prime Minister.
These years were seen as the height of "consensus politics". However, by the 1970s many traditional methods of running the economy, managing relations with trade unions, and so on began to fail—or had outright already failed. This was also a period of Labour-Party ascendancy, as they ruled for nearly twelve out of the fifteen years between 1964 and 1979. Many in the Conservative Party were left wondering how to proceed.
The Thatcher Years, 1975-1990
United Kingdom general election, October 1974
The United Kingdom general election of October 1974 took place on 10 October 1974 to elect 635 members to the British House of Commons. It was the second general election of that year and resulted in the Labour Party led by Harold Wilson, winning by a tiny majority of 3 seats.The election of...
a system was put in place and Heath agreed to holding a leadership election
Conservative Party (UK) leadership election, 1975
Edward Heath, leader of the Conservative Party and Prime Minister of the United Kingdom had called and unexpectedly lost the February 1974 general election...
to allow him to renew his mandate. Few both inside and out of the party expected him to be seriously challenged, let alone defeated. However Margaret Thatcher
Margaret Thatcher
Margaret Hilda Thatcher, Baroness Thatcher, was Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 1979 to 1990...
stood against Heath and in a shock result outpolled him on the first ballot, leading him to withdraw from the contest. Thatcher then faced off four other candidates to become the first woman to lead a major British political party. Thatcher had much support from the monetarists
Monetarism
Monetarism is a tendency in economic thought that emphasizes the role of governments in controlling the amount of money in circulation. It is the view within monetary economics that variation in the money supply has major influences on national output in the short run and the price level over...
, led by Keith Joseph
Keith Joseph
Keith St John Joseph, Baron Joseph, Bt, CH, PC , was a British barrister and politician. A member of the Conservative Party, he served in the Cabinet under three Prime Ministers , and is widely regarded to have been the "power behind the throne" in the creation of what came to be known as...
. The Conservatives capitalised on the Winter of Discontent
Winter of Discontent
The "Winter of Discontent" is an expression, popularised by the British media, referring to the winter of 1978–79 in the United Kingdom, during which there were widespread strikes by local authority trade unions demanding larger pay rises for their members, because the Labour government of...
and the growing inflation rate, not to mention the humiliating bailout of the UK economy by the IMF
International Monetary Fund
The International Monetary Fund is an organization of 187 countries, working to foster global monetary cooperation, secure financial stability, facilitate international trade, promote high employment and sustainable economic growth, and reduce poverty around the world...
in 1976, and won the 1979 general election
United Kingdom general election, 1979
The United Kingdom general election of 1979 was held on 3 May 1979 to elect 635 members to the British House of Commons. The Conservative Party, led by Margaret Thatcher ousted the incumbent Labour government of James Callaghan with a parliamentary majority of 43 seats...
with a majority of 43. Thatcher, thereby became the UK's first woman Prime Minister.
Thatcher soon introduced controversial and difficult, but ultimately successful, economic reforms after two decades of decline. The Falklands War
Falklands War
The Falklands War , also called the Falklands Conflict or Falklands Crisis, was fought in 1982 between Argentina and the United Kingdom over the disputed Falkland Islands and South Georgia and the South Sandwich Islands...
, the perceived extreme left
Hard left
Hard left is a name often given to an internal tendency within the British Labour Party. Similar terminology is used also in the context of the Australian Labor Party....
nature of the Labour Party, and the intervention of the centrist SDP-Liberal Alliance
SDP-Liberal Alliance
The SDP–Liberal Alliance was an electoral pact formed by the Social Democratic Party and the Liberal Party in the United Kingdom which was in existence from 1981 to 1988, when the bulk of the two parties merged to form the Social and Liberal Democrats, later referred to as simply the Liberal...
all contributed to her party winning the 1983 general election
United Kingdom general election, 1983
The 1983 United Kingdom general election was held on 9 June 1983. It gave the Conservative Party under Margaret Thatcher the most decisive election victory since that of Labour in 1945...
in a landslide, gaining a majority of 144. Thatcher won the 1987 general election
United Kingdom general election, 1987
The United Kingdom general election of 1987 was held on 11 June 1987, to elect 650 members to the British House of Commons. The election was the third consecutive election victory for the Conservative Party under the leadership of Margaret Thatcher, who became the first Prime Minister since the 2nd...
with another large, but reduced majority of 102.
The second and third terms were dominated by privatisations of Britain's many state-owned industries, including British Telecom in 1984, the bus companies in 1985, British Gas
British Gas plc
British Gas plc was formerly the monopoly gas supplier and is a private sector in the United Kingdom.- History :In the early 1900s the gas market in the United Kingdom was mainly run by county councils and small private firms...
in 1986, British Airways
British Airways
British Airways is the flag carrier airline of the United Kingdom, based in Waterside, near its main hub at London Heathrow Airport. British Airways is the largest airline in the UK based on fleet size, international flights and international destinations...
in 1987, British Leyland, and British Steel
British Steel
British Steel was a major British steel producer. It originated as a nationalised industry, the British Steel Corporation , formed in 1967. This was converted to a public limited company, British Steel PLC, and privatised in 1988. It was once a constituent of the FTSE 100 Index...
in 1988. In 1984 Mrs. Thatcher also successfully concluded five-year long negotiations over Britain's budget to the European Economic Community. (See UK rebate
UK rebate
The UK rebate is a rebate on the United Kingdom's contribution to the EU budget paid back to the UK government by the European Union.-History:...
.)
In 1989, the Community Charge
Community Charge
The Community Charge, popularly known as the "poll tax", was a system of taxation introduced in replacement of the rates to part fund local government in Scotland from 1989, and England and Wales from 1990. It provided for a single flat-rate per-capita tax on every adult, at a rate set by the...
(frequently referred to as the "poll tax
Poll tax
A poll tax is a tax of a portioned, fixed amount per individual in accordance with the census . When a corvée is commuted for cash payment, in effect it becomes a poll tax...
") was introduced to replace the ancient system of rates (based on property values) which funded local government. This unpopular new charge was a flat rate per adult no matter what their circumstances; it seemed to be shifting the tax burden disproportionately onto the poor. Once again Thatcher's popularity sagged, but this time the Conservatives thought it might cost them the election. Michael Heseltine
Michael Heseltine
Michael Ray Dibdin Heseltine, Baron Heseltine, CH, PC is a British businessman, Conservative politician and patron of the Tory Reform Group. He was a Member of Parliament from 1966 to 2001 and was a prominent figure in the governments of Margaret Thatcher and John Major...
, a former cabinet member, challenged her for the leadership in 1990
Conservative Party (UK) leadership election, 1990
The 1990 Conservative Party leadership election in the United Kingdom took place in November 1990 following the decision of former Defence and Environment Secretary Michael Heseltine to stand against the incumbent Conservative leader and Prime Minister, Margaret Thatcher.Thatcher failed to win...
. She won the first round, but not enough to win outright, and after taking soundings from cabinet members, she announced her intention not to contest the second ballot. In the ensuing second ballot, the Chancellor of the Exchequer
Chancellor of the Exchequer
The Chancellor of the Exchequer is the title held by the British Cabinet minister who is responsible for all economic and financial matters. Often simply called the Chancellor, the office-holder controls HM Treasury and plays a role akin to the posts of Minister of Finance or Secretary of the...
John Major
John Major
Sir John Major, is a British Conservative politician, who served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom and Leader of the Conservative Party from 1990–1997...
beat Heseltine and Douglas Hurd
Douglas Hurd
Douglas Richard Hurd, Baron Hurd of Westwell, CH, CBE, PC , is a British Conservative politician and novelist, who served in the governments of Margaret Thatcher and John Major between 1979 and his retirement in 1995....
.
The Major years: 1990-1997
Council tax
Council Tax is the system of local taxation used in England, Scotland and Wales to part fund the services provided by local government in each country. It was introduced in 1993 by the Local Government Finance Act 1992, as a successor to the unpopular Community Charge...
, and continued with the privatisations, and went on to narrowly win the 1992 election
United Kingdom general election, 1992
The United Kingdom general election of 1992 was held on 9 April 1992, and was the fourth consecutive victory for the Conservative Party. This election result was one of the biggest surprises in 20th Century politics, as polling leading up to the day of the election showed Labour under leader Neil...
with a majority of 21.
Major's government was beset by scandals, crisis, and missteps. Many of the scandals were about the personal lives of politicians which the media construed as hypocrisy, but the Cash for Questions affair and the divisions over EU
European Union
The European Union is an economic and political union of 27 independent member states which are located primarily in Europe. The EU traces its origins from the European Coal and Steel Community and the European Economic Community , formed by six countries in 1958...
were substantive. In 1995, Major resigned as Leader of the Conservative Party in order to trigger a leadership election
Conservative Party (UK) leadership election, 1995
The 1995 Conservative leadership election was initiated when incumbent leader and Prime Minister John Major resigned as leader on 22 June 1995, in order to face down critics within his party...
which he hoped would give him a renewed mandate, and quieten the Maastricht rebels (e.g. Iain Duncan Smith
Iain Duncan Smith
George Iain Duncan Smith is a British Conservative politician. He is currently the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions and was previously leader of the Conservative Party from September 2001 to October 2003...
, Bill Cash, Bernard Jenkin
Bernard Jenkin
Bernard Christison Jenkin is a politician in the United Kingdom, and the current Member of Parliament for Harwich and North Essex...
). John Redwood
John Redwood
John Alan Redwood is a British Conservative Party politician and Member of Parliament for Wokingham. He was formerly Secretary of State for Wales in Prime Minister John Major's Cabinet and was an unsuccessful challenger for the leadership of the Conservative Party in 1995...
, then Secretary of State for Wales, stood against Major and gained around a fifth of the leadership vote. He was one of the people whom Major inadvertently referred to as 'bastards' during a television interview. Major was pleased that Michael Heseltine
Michael Heseltine
Michael Ray Dibdin Heseltine, Baron Heseltine, CH, PC is a British businessman, Conservative politician and patron of the Tory Reform Group. He was a Member of Parliament from 1966 to 2001 and was a prominent figure in the governments of Margaret Thatcher and John Major...
had not stood against him and gave him the position of Deputy Prime Minister
Deputy Prime Minister
A deputy prime minister or vice prime minister is, in some counties, a government minister who can take the position of acting prime minister when the prime minister is temporarily absent. The position is often likened to that of a vice president, but is significantly different, though both...
as a result.
As the term went on, with by-elections being consistently lost by the Conservatives, their majority declined and eventually vanished entirely. Getting every vote out became increasingly important to both sides, and on several occasions ill MPs were wheeled into the Commons
British House of Commons
The House of Commons is the lower house of the Parliament of the United Kingdom, which also comprises the Sovereign and the House of Lords . Both Commons and Lords meet in the Palace of Westminster. The Commons is a democratically elected body, consisting of 650 members , who are known as Members...
to vote. Eventually, the Government became a technical minority.
As predicted, the general election of May 1997
United Kingdom general election, 1997
The United Kingdom general election, 1997 was held on 1 May 1997, more than five years after the previous election on 9 April 1992, to elect 659 members to the British House of Commons. The Labour Party ended its 18 years in opposition under the leadership of Tony Blair, and won the general...
was a win for the Labour Party, but the magnitude of the victory surprised almost everyone. There was a swing of 20% in some places, and Labour achieved a majority of 179 with 43% of the vote to the Conservatives' 31%. Tactical voting
Tactical voting
In voting systems, tactical voting occurs, in elections with more than two viable candidates, when a voter supports a candidate other than his or her sincere preference in order to prevent an undesirable outcome.It has been shown by the Gibbard-Satterthwaite theorem that any voting method which is...
against the Conservatives is believed to have caused around 40 seats to change hands. They lost all their seats outside of England, with prominent members such as Michael Portillo
Michael Portillo
Michael Denzil Xavier Portillo is a British journalist, broadcaster, and former Conservative Party politician and Cabinet Minister...
and Malcolm Rifkind
Malcolm Rifkind
Sir Malcolm Leslie Rifkind KCMG QC MP is a British Conservative Party politician and Member of Parliament for Kensington. He served in various roles as a cabinet minister under Prime Ministers Margaret Thatcher and John Major, including Secretary of State for Scotland , Defence Secretary and...
among the losses. Major resigned within 24 hours.
It is often said that the Conservatives lost the 1997 election due to EU party-policy divisions. However, it is likely that the European question played only a small or insignificant part in the result. Accusations of "Tory sleaze", apathy towards a government that had been in power for nearly two decades, and a rebranded "New" Labour Party with a dynamic and charismatic leader (Tony Blair
Tony Blair
Anthony Charles Lynton Blair is a former British Labour Party politician who served as the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 2 May 1997 to 27 June 2007. He was the Member of Parliament for Sedgefield from 1983 to 2007 and Leader of the Labour Party from 1994 to 2007...
) are all probable factors in the Conservative defeat.
Tory "sleaze"
A number of political scandals in the 1990s (building on previous examples in the 1980s) created the impression of what is described in the British press as "sleaze": a perception, peaking towards the end of the Major era, that the Conservatives were associated with political corruptionPolitical corruption
Political corruption is the use of legislated powers by government officials for illegitimate private gain. Misuse of government power for other purposes, such as repression of political opponents and general police brutality, is not considered political corruption. Neither are illegal acts by...
and hypocrisy
Hypocrisy
Hypocrisy is the state of pretending to have virtues, moral or religious beliefs, principles, etc., that one does not actually have. Hypocrisy involves the deception of others and is thus a kind of lie....
. In particular the successful entrapment of Graham Riddick
Graham Riddick
Graham Edward Galloway Riddick was the Conservative Party Member of Parliament for Colne Valley in West Yorkshire, England from 1987 to 1997.-Family and early life:...
and David Tredinnick
David Tredinnick (politician)
David Arthur Stephen Tredinnick is a Conservative politician in the United Kingdom.He is a former officer in the Grenadier Guards and is Member of Parliament for Bosworth first elected in 1987....
in the "cash for questions" scandal, the contemporaneous misconduct as a minister by Neil Hamilton
Neil Hamilton (politician)
Mostyn Neil Hamilton is a former British barrister, teacher and Conservative MP. Since losing his seat in 1997 and leaving politics, Hamilton and his wife Christine have become media celebrities...
(who lost a consequent libel action against The Guardian), and the convictions of former Cabinet member Jonathan Aitken
Jonathan Aitken
Jonathan William Patrick Aitken is a former Conservative Member of Parliament in the United Kingdom, and British government minister. He was convicted of perjury in 1999 and received an 18-month prison sentence, of which he served seven months...
and former party deputy chairman Jeffrey Archer for perjury
Perjury
Perjury, also known as forswearing, is the willful act of swearing a false oath or affirmation to tell the truth, whether spoken or in writing, concerning matters material to a judicial proceeding. That is, the witness falsely promises to tell the truth about matters which affect the outcome of the...
in two separate cases leading to custodial sentences damaged the Conservatives' public reputation. Persistent unsubstantiated rumours about the activities of the party treasurer Michael Ashcroft did not help this impression.
At the same time a series of revelations about the private lives of various Conservative politicians also grabbed the headlines and both the media and the party's opponents made little attempt to clarify the distinction between financial conduct and private lives.
John Major
John Major
Sir John Major, is a British Conservative politician, who served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom and Leader of the Conservative Party from 1990–1997...
's "Back to Basics
Back to Basics (campaign)
Back to Basics was an ill-fated attempt to relaunch the government of British Prime Minister John Major in 1993; a year after winning the general election the party's reputation was declining, not least due to the Black Wednesday economic debacle of September 1992...
" morality campaign back-fired on him by providing an excuse for the British media to expose "sleaze" within the Conservative Party and, most damagingly, within the Cabinet itself. A number of ministers were then revealed to have committed sexual indiscretions, and Major was forced by media pressure to dismiss them. In September 2002 it was revealed that, prior to his promotion to the cabinet, Major had himself had a longstanding extramarital affair with a fellow MP, Edwina Currie
Edwina Currie
Edwina Jonesnée Cohen is a former British Member of Parliament. First elected as a Conservative Party MP in 1983, she was a Junior Health Minister for two years, before resigning in 1988 over the controversy over salmonella in eggs...
.
William Hague: 1997-2001
The ensuing leadership electionConservative Party (UK) leadership election, 1997
A leadership election was triggered in the British Conservative Party when John Major resigned on 2 May 1997, following his party's defeat at the 1997 general election .-Announced:...
was contested by five candidates. The electorate for the contest consisted solely of the 165 Conservative MPs who had been returned to the House of Commons. The candidates were Kenneth Clarke
Kenneth Clarke
Kenneth Harry "Ken" Clarke, QC, MP is a British Conservative politician, currently Member of Parliament for Rushcliffe, Lord Chancellor and Secretary of State for Justice. He was first elected to Parliament in 1970; and appointed a minister in Edward Heath's government, in 1972, and is one of...
, William Hague
William Hague
William Jefferson Hague is the British Foreign Secretary and First Secretary of State. He served as Leader of the Conservative Party from June 1997 to September 2001...
, John Redwood
John Redwood
John Alan Redwood is a British Conservative Party politician and Member of Parliament for Wokingham. He was formerly Secretary of State for Wales in Prime Minister John Major's Cabinet and was an unsuccessful challenger for the leadership of the Conservative Party in 1995...
, Peter Lilley
Peter Lilley
Peter Bruce Lilley MP is a British Conservative Party politician who has been a Member of Parliament MP since 1983. He currently represents the constituency of Hitchin and Harpenden and, prior to boundary changes, represented St Albans...
and Michael Howard
Michael Howard
Michael Howard, Baron Howard of Lympne, CH, QC, PC is a British politician, who served as the Leader of the Conservative Party and Leader of the Opposition from November 2003 to December 2005...
, with Stephen Dorrell
Stephen Dorrell
Stephen James Dorrell is a British politician. A member of the Conservative Party, he served in the Cabinet of Prime Minister John Major as Secretary of State for National Heritage and Secretary of State for Health...
launching an initial bid but withdrawing before polling began, citing limited support, and backing Clarke. Clarke was the favoured candidate of the Europhile
Europhile
A europhile is a person who is fond of, admires, or even loves European culture, society, history, food, etc. In politics, it may be used to imply Pro-Europeanism, or support for the European Union, often disapprovingly...
left of the party, while the three latter candidates divided right-wing support roughly equally. Hague, who had initially supported Howard, emerged second as a compromise candidate and won the final ballot after Redwood and Clarke negotiated a joint ticket which was derided as an Instability Pact by their opponents (punning on the economic Stability Pact of the European Community).
At first William Hague portrayed himself as a moderniser with a common touch. However by the time the 2001 general election
United Kingdom general election, 2001
The United Kingdom general election, 2001 was held on Thursday 7 June 2001 to elect 659 members to the British House of Commons. It was dubbed "the quiet landslide" by the media, as the Labour Party was re-elected with another landslide result and only suffered a net loss of 6 seats...
came he concentrated on Europe, asylum seekers and tax cuts whilst declaring that only the Conservative Party could "Save the Pound". Though a master debater who would regularly trounce Tony Blair in the Commons, his leadership tenure was beset by poor publicity and stumbles. Despite a low turnout, the election resulted in a net gain of a single seat for the Conservative Party and William Hague's resignation as party leader.
Iain Duncan Smith: 2001-2003
The 2001 leadership electionConservative Party (UK) leadership election, 2001
The 2001 Conservative leadership election was held after the United Kingdom Conservative Party failed to make inroads into the Labour government's lead in the 2001 general election. Party leader William Hague resigned, and a leadership contest was called under new rules Hague had introduced...
was conducted under a new leadership electoral system designed by Hague. This resulted in five candidates competing for the job: Michael Portillo
Michael Portillo
Michael Denzil Xavier Portillo is a British journalist, broadcaster, and former Conservative Party politician and Cabinet Minister...
, Iain Duncan Smith
Iain Duncan Smith
George Iain Duncan Smith is a British Conservative politician. He is currently the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions and was previously leader of the Conservative Party from September 2001 to October 2003...
, Kenneth Clarke
Kenneth Clarke
Kenneth Harry "Ken" Clarke, QC, MP is a British Conservative politician, currently Member of Parliament for Rushcliffe, Lord Chancellor and Secretary of State for Justice. He was first elected to Parliament in 1970; and appointed a minister in Edward Heath's government, in 1972, and is one of...
, David Davis
David Davis (British politician)
David Michael Davis is a British Conservative Party politician who is the Member of Parliament for the constituency of Haltemprice and Howden...
and Michael Ancram
Michael Ancram
Michael Andrew Foster Jude Kerr, 13th Marquess of Lothian, PC, QC , known as Michael Ancram, is a United Kingdom Conservative Party politician. He is a member of the House of Lords, former Member of Parliament, and a former member of the Shadow Cabinet...
. The drawn-out and at times acrimonious election saw Conservative MPs select Iain Duncan Smith and Ken Clarke to be put forward for a vote by party members. As Conservative Party members are characteristically Eurosceptic, Iain Duncan Smith was elected, even though opinion polls showed that the public preferred Ken Clarke, a member of the Tory Reform Group
Tory Reform Group
The Tory Reform Group is a group aligned to, but independent of, the British Conservative Party, that works to promote the values of the One Nation Tory vision...
. (Main article: 2001 Conservative leadership election.)
Iain Duncan Smith (often known as IDS) was a strong Eurosceptic
Euroscepticism
Euroscepticism is a general term used to describe criticism of the European Union , and opposition to the process of European integration, existing throughout the political spectrum. Traditionally, the main source of euroscepticism has been the notion that integration weakens the nation state...
but this did not define his leadership - indeed it was during his tenure that Europe ceased to be an issue of division in the party as it united behind calls for a referendum on the proposed European Union Constitution. Duncan Smith's Shadow Cabinet
Shadow Cabinet
The Shadow Cabinet is a senior group of opposition spokespeople in the Westminster system of government who together under the leadership of the Leader of the Opposition form an alternative cabinet to the government's, whose members shadow or mark each individual member of the government...
contained many new and unfamiliar faces but despite predictions by some that the party would lurch to the right the team instead followed a pragmatic moderate approach to policy.
On 27 October Iain Duncan Smith began to face calls within his own party to either resign as leader or face a vote of confidence. Under the rules of the Conservative party, the backbench Conservative 1922 Committee would review the leadership, and in order for this to take place the chairman of the committee, Sir Michael Spicer must be presented with 25 letters proposing a vote.
On 28 October sufficient letters were presented to the chairman of the 1922 Committee to initiate a vote of confidence in Iain Duncan Smith. The vote came on 29 October, and IDS lost 90 to 75.
Michael Howard: 2003-2005
Duncan Smith remained as caretaker leader until Michael HowardMichael Howard
Michael Howard, Baron Howard of Lympne, CH, QC, PC is a British politician, who served as the Leader of the Conservative Party and Leader of the Opposition from November 2003 to December 2005...
, MP
Member of Parliament
A Member of Parliament is a representative of the voters to a :parliament. In many countries with bicameral parliaments, the term applies specifically to members of the lower house, as upper houses often have a different title, such as senate, and thus also have different titles for its members,...
for Folkestone
Folkestone
Folkestone is the principal town in the Shepway District of Kent, England. Its original site was in a valley in the sea cliffs and it developed through fishing and its closeness to the Continent as a landing place and trading port. The coming of the railways, the building of a ferry port, and its...
and Hythe
Hythe, Kent
Hythe , is a small coastal market town on the edge of Romney Marsh, in the District of Shepway on the south coast of Kent. The word Hythe or Hithe is an Old English word meaning Haven or Landing Place....
, was elected to the post of leader
Conservative Party (UK) leadership election, 2003
The 2003 Conservative leadership election was caused by the enforced resignation of incumbent leader Iain Duncan-Smith after the loss of a confidence vote amongst his parliamentary party...
(as the only candidate) on 6 November 2003.
Howard announced radical changes to the way the Shadow Cabinet
Shadow Cabinet
The Shadow Cabinet is a senior group of opposition spokespeople in the Westminster system of government who together under the leadership of the Leader of the Opposition form an alternative cabinet to the government's, whose members shadow or mark each individual member of the government...
would work. He slashed the number of members by half, with Theresa May
Theresa May
Theresa Mary May is a British Conservative politician who is Home Secretary in the Conservative – Liberal Democrat Coalition government. She was elected to Parliament in 1997 as the Member of Parliament for Maidenhead, and served as the Chairman of the Conservative Party, 2003–04...
and Tim Yeo
Tim Yeo
Timothy Stephen Kenneth Yeo is an English Conservative politician, Member of Parliament for South Suffolk and the current Chairman of the Energy and Climate Change Select Committee.-Early life:...
each shadowing two government departments. Minor departments still have shadows but have been removed from the cabinet, and the post of Shadow Leader of the House of Commons
British House of Commons
The House of Commons is the lower house of the Parliament of the United Kingdom, which also comprises the Sovereign and the House of Lords . Both Commons and Lords meet in the Palace of Westminster. The Commons is a democratically elected body, consisting of 650 members , who are known as Members...
was abolished. The role of party chairman was also split into two, with Lord Saatchi responsible for the party machine, and Liam Fox
Liam Fox
Liam Fox MP is a British Conservative politician, Member of Parliament for North Somerset, and former Secretary of State for Defence....
handling publicity. Michael Portillo
Michael Portillo
Michael Denzil Xavier Portillo is a British journalist, broadcaster, and former Conservative Party politician and Cabinet Minister...
was offered a position but refused, due to his plans to step down from Parliament at the next election.
Also, a panel of "grandees", including John Major
John Major
Sir John Major, is a British Conservative politician, who served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom and Leader of the Conservative Party from 1990–1997...
, Iain Duncan Smith
Iain Duncan Smith
George Iain Duncan Smith is a British Conservative politician. He is currently the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions and was previously leader of the Conservative Party from September 2001 to October 2003...
, William Hague
William Hague
William Jefferson Hague is the British Foreign Secretary and First Secretary of State. He served as Leader of the Conservative Party from June 1997 to September 2001...
and, notably, Kenneth Clarke
Kenneth Clarke
Kenneth Harry "Ken" Clarke, QC, MP is a British Conservative politician, currently Member of Parliament for Rushcliffe, Lord Chancellor and Secretary of State for Justice. He was first elected to Parliament in 1970; and appointed a minister in Edward Heath's government, in 1972, and is one of...
has been set up to advise the leadership as they see fit.
On 2 January 2004, influenced by Saatchi, Howard defined a personal credo and list of core beliefs of the party. At the party conference of October 2004, the Conservatives presented their "Timetable For Action
Timetable For Action
The Timetable For Action is a policy document by the U.K. Conservative Party, in which leader Michael Howard spells out some key actions he would take if elected Prime Minister, within the first hour, day, week, and month of a Conservative government....
" that a Conservative government would follow.
In the 2005 general election, the Conservative Party made a partial recovery by a net gain of 31 seats, with the Labour majority falling to 66.
The day after, on 6 May, Howard announced that he believed himself too old to lead the party into another election campaign, and he would therefore be stepping down to allow a new leader the time to prepare for the next election. Howard said that he believed that the party needed to amend the rules governing the election of the Party leader, and that he would allow time for that to happen before resigning. See Conservative Party (UK) leadership election, 2005
Conservative Party (UK) leadership election, 2005
The 2005 Conservative leadership election was called by party leader Michael Howard on 6 May 2005, when he announced that he would be stepping down as leader in the near future. However, he stated that he would not depart until a review of the rules for the leadership election had been conducted,...
The 2005 campaign received criticism from its main financial backer, Michael Spencer
Michael Spencer
Michael Alan Spencer is a British businessman; the chief executive of ICAP plc, the world's largest interdealer broker...
. In an interview with The Times
The Times
The Times is a British daily national newspaper, first published in London in 1785 under the title The Daily Universal Register . The Times and its sister paper The Sunday Times are published by Times Newspapers Limited, a subsidiary since 1981 of News International...
Tim Collins
Tim Collins (politician)
Timothy William George Collins, CBE, is a British politician, once a prominent member of the Conservative Party. Collins was active in the 1990s and was later the Member of Parliament for Westmorland and Lonsdale in north-west England from 1997 until defeat at the 2005 general...
claimed that the specific reasons the party won more seats may not repeat themselves in the next general election::
- The unpopularity of Tony Blair. This helped the Liberal Democrats and hence the Conservative Party in close fights. Blair will not be standing at the next election.
- The left-of-Labour policies of the Liberal Democrats helped Conservatives in Conservative/Lib Dem marginal seats.
- Labour's campaign in their marginal seats was poor.
David Cameron: 2005 to present
David CameronDavid Cameron
David William Donald Cameron is the current Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, First Lord of the Treasury, Minister for the Civil Service and Leader of the Conservative Party. Cameron represents Witney as its Member of Parliament ....
won the subsequent leadership campaign on 6 December 2005. Cameron beat his closest rival David Davis
David Davis (British politician)
David Michael Davis is a British Conservative Party politician who is the Member of Parliament for the constituency of Haltemprice and Howden...
by a margin of more than two to one, taking 134,446 votes to 64,398, and announced his intention to reform and realign the Conservative Party in a manner similar to that achieved by the Labour Party in opposition under Tony Blair. As part of this he distanced from himself from the much hated Conservative Party of the past, for example apologising for Section 28
Section 28
Section 28 of the Local Government Act 1988 caused the controversial addition of Section 2A to the Local Government Act 1986 , enacted on 24 May 1988 and repealed on 21 June 2000 in Scotland, and on 18 November 2003 in the rest of Great Britain by section 122 of the Local Government Act 2003...
, and focused in on modern environmental issues.
In April 2006 the party set out to deliver a promise by Cameron to modernize its parliamentary representation. A central candidates' committee reduced some five hundred aspiring politicians on the party's list of approved parliamentary candidates to an "A-list" of between 100 and 150 priority candidates. More than half of the names on the resulting list proved to be female, and several were of non-Establishment figures of various kinds.
After the party had led in opinion poll
Opinion poll
An opinion poll, sometimes simply referred to as a poll is a survey of public opinion from a particular sample. Opinion polls are usually designed to represent the opinions of a population by conducting a series of questions and then extrapolating generalities in ratio or within confidence...
s for most of Cameron's time in office, a hung parliament
Hung parliament
In a two-party parliamentary system of government, a hung parliament occurs when neither major political party has an absolute majority of seats in the parliament . It is also less commonly known as a balanced parliament or a legislature under no overall control...
was achieved in the 2010 General Election, with the Conservatives achieving the most votes and largest number of seats in parliament. This outcome had been widely predicted and was largely due to a surge in support for the Liberal Democrats. Cameron successfully negotiated with the Liberal Democrats
Liberal Democrats
The Liberal Democrats are a social liberal political party in the United Kingdom which supports constitutional and electoral reform, progressive taxation, wealth taxation, human rights laws, cultural liberalism, banking reform and civil liberties .The party was formed in 1988 by a merger of the...
on forming a coalition government
Coalition government
A coalition government is a cabinet of a parliamentary government in which several political parties cooperate. The usual reason given for this arrangement is that no party on its own can achieve a majority in the parliament...
.
External links
- The History of the Conservatives - conservatives.com
- Conservative History Group