"A Great Third Party" - A British Political TL

"A Great Third Party"

Prelude

In our timeline many people in Britain and in fact around the world have accepted the fact that the United Kingdom was one of the only places in Europe that didn’t fall to both the far left and the far right. People view Britain as a bastion of fairness, equality and the right to have your say. Though of course this view isn’t completely true, with well-known politicians failing to do as they promised such as Stanley Baldwin and his promise to try and increase cheaper trade within the British Empire, to politicians denying possible ways out of the depression because they seemed to socialist as Philip Snowden did. Even the most famous British Prime Minister, Winston Churchill saying that the government should use machine guns on the strikers during the General Strike of 1926. But through all this Britain came out well, and so seemed to be the only ‘sane’ nation left in Europe it seemed during the 30’s. With the Nazis in Germany taking hold of the German government in 1933, Italy invading Abyssinia in 1935 and the Paris riots in 1934 along with other madness on the continent that involved both the far right and far left. Though Britain managed to largely avoid this apart from the Battle of Cable Street in 1936 in which a group of fascists paraded through London’s East End and ended up in a brawl between the Jews, workers etc. of the area and the thugs of the British Union of Fascists (ran by Oswald Mosley) fighting back (though thankfully there were no deaths, just injuries). But what if some mature, less thug-ish politicians got involved? Ones who didn’t simply run a party on Anti-Semitism or Anti-Communism? What if some older and more experienced politicians merged the mid-far right parties and ended up with a slightly radical party in Britain? This is my interpretation of how this would turn out for the nation.​
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June, 1918: In the constituency of Clapham a by-election is held and three candidates stand. Among them are John Battley for the ILP, Harry Greer for the Conservatives and Harry Beamish as an independent. Harry Beamish won the by-election with a majority of just 29.

December, 1918: After the results of the 1918 General Election there are 6 National Party MPs elected[1]. Some of these include Sir Richard Cooper (Walsall), Henry Croft (Bournemouth), Captain Gordon Aston (Paddington North) and Harry Beamish (Clapham). In Hackney South an independent by the name of Horatio Bottomley is elected as an MP again. Also 3 days after the General Election 2 MPs crossed over to the National Party - Edward FitzRoy (Daventry) and Alan Burgoyne (Kensington North)[2].

1919: Horatio Bottomley creates the 'People's League' that he hopes will become "a great Third Party" which would represent "the People".

1920: Horatio Bottomley goes onto create the 'Independent Parliamentary Group' to complement the league. He stood George Makgill in East Leyton though Makgill failed to win the by-election. By the end of 1920 and early 1921 the group contained the following MPs: Cecil Beck, Christopher Lowther, Claude Lowther, Charles Frederick Palmer and Sir C. V. F. Townshend

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[1] - The Primary POD in this TL.
[2] - Result of the National Party being more successful.
 
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1921: The National Party wins all the by-elections they will stand in for the 31st Parliament. They succeed in gathering 4 more MPs bringing the total number of National Party MPs up to 12 MPs. Also the MP John Newman begins to work heavily with Henry Croft. The Anti-Waste League is created in this year by Lord Rothermere to combat the governments overspending. The AWL gains 3 seats through by-elections of 1921. It was around this time that many previous members and supporters of the 'British Empire Union' turned their attentions to the National Party, and this led to an influx of new power and new support for the party.

1922: In the 1922 General Election the National Party gathered up an extra 17 seats, an astonishing outcome for the party which had only been created 4 years previously and yet had gained 29 MPs within that time. But the newly made Anti-Waste League did less successfully with only gaining 2 new MPs bringing their total up to 5, this lack of major success would contribute to it's merging with the NP later in the parties life. 4 Independent candidates who were supported by the Independent Parliamentary Group[3] were also voted in, thus making Bottomley a figure to be recognized in Parliament along with his 'People's League'. It was in this year that the Conservative MP John Newman left the Conservatives and joined the more radical and slightly more right-wing organization, the National Party.

1923: Throughout the time period between the 1922 General Election and the 1923 General Election the National Party gained one more MP through by-elections, the AWL gained none and an IPG backed independent was forced to resign due to imprisonment from fraud. Later in the year, around mid 1923 the Horatio Bottomley chose to try and integrate his IPG with the National Party who had great national success. By late 1923 the parties had merged and the independents split, 2 of the independents joined the National Party, while the last independent held onto his constituency as a simple independent not affiliated with any party. In the 1923 General Election the National party gained 5 more seats in Parliament and brought its total number of MPs up to 36 MPs. The AWL had gone through a revamp and had become up much more wide-viewing party and had renamed itself the 'British League', though it still managed to only gain 2 more MPs in parliament and had only just managed to hold the MPs they had due to being eclipsed by the National Party. Also the 'British Fascisti' is created in this year by Rotha Lintorn-Orman, the first avowedly fascist party created in Britain.

General Information on the British Political State in this TL
In the General Election of 1923 the Conservatives gain 212 of the seats, with Labour gaining 201 of the votes which was a huge achievement for the Labour party. The re-united Liberal party won 154 of the seats and the fourth largest party is the National Party with 36 seats in Parliament. The Labour and Liberal party have entered into a coalition and thus Labour with a minority government of only 11 seats had managed to place Ramsay MacDonald as the Prime Minister of the UK.

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[3] - In this TL Horatio Bottomley is honest and takes no part in his OTL fraudulent business ventures.
 
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So in this TL Horatio Bottomley was not tried and imprisoned for fraud. At least not yet. Is that because he was honest?

After the general election of 1923 was there a coalition government with Labour and Liberal ministers, or a Labour government with Liberal support?
 
So in this TL Horatio Bottomley was not tried and imprisoned for fraud. At least not yet. Is that because he was honest?

After the general election of 1923 was there a coalition government with Labour and Liberal ministers, or a Labour government with Liberal support?

Yeah, forgot to make a note on that. Bottomley is honest in this and takes no part in anymore fraudulent business ventures in this TL (which means he won't be imprisoned again).

In the Coalition government the Liberals are supporting the Labour Party, there aren't both Liberal and Labour ministers in the coalition. They're doing this to simply to stop the Conservatives, though this coalition will soon end.
 
The Labour/Liberal Split
In 1923 the Labour Party allied itself with the Liberals to create a coalition government against the Conservative party. Ramsay MacDonald became the Prime Minister but already came to confrontation with the Conservatives and his own Liberal supporters. Within a year by 1924 Ramsay MacDonald had barely done anything 'magnificent' that people believed would come out from the Labour Government and thus he'd lost nearly all of his Liberal supporters. MacDonald then lost a vote of no confidence and was forced to dissolve parliament and call for a General Election. It's rumored that David Lloyd George threatened to split the Liberals again if they didn't halt their support of a "failed Labour government", which was the reason as to why Herbert Asquith withdrew his support.

1924: In the General Election of 1924 the Conservatives regained their majority in parliament of over 136 seats (their total number of seats were 365), giving them a clear mandate in government. But one oddity in the election was that Oswald Mosley managed to gain the seat of 'Birmingham Ladywood' from Neville Chamberlain[4] with just over 12 votes in it, thus winning a minor victory for the Labour Party. The National Party managed to win 51 seats, and oddly enough it's been said that it was at this point that Bournemouth (Henry Crofts seat) became the "Center of a National Britain" and it in fact became a 'safe seat' for the National Party around this time. The 'British League' actually lost two seats to the National Party and the Conservatives and thus it began its talks with Henry Croft as to a possible merger between the parties. Oswald Mosley is placed as the Shadow Secretary of State for Air in the Labour Shadow Cabinet. Lastly the 'National Fascisti' was created this year after a split from the 'British Fascisti' over disputes about the BF's ability to have a set goal in its political career.

1925: The 'British League' and National Party are officially merged to form the 'British National League'. The leader is still Henry Page Croft in his 'safe seat' of Bournemouth. Also a large number of BF members join the new BNL due to its radicalism and their inability to fully understand fascism, this further weakened the BF to a point at which it almost dissolved. Also a year after having been taken to the Gold Standard by Austen Chamberlain[5] the economy of Britain continues to collapse, leading to more feeling of unrest from the various workers affected by it.
 
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