A Hard left Labour Government in the 1980s

I accept that this is extraordinarily unlikely however imagine a few changes

First The ICE patrol ship stays in the Falklands and there is no South Atlantic War

Secondly Owen wins the SDP leadership and manges to cause a real crisis with Liberals, perhaps that no Liberal supporting independent nuclear disarmament be allowed to be a candidate

Thirdly Thatcher pushes further right policies, perhaps proposing a Poll Tax in a 1984 election.

Is there any chance that there would be an attempt to prevent a Labour Parliamentary Majority (based on perhaps 38% of the vote 35% Conservaiv 13% SDP,10 % Liberal 4% Other) Actually exercising power
 

AndyC

Donor
Wouldn't be enough. The Falklands bounce turned what would have been a healthy majority in 1983 into a landslide. The Alliance possibly took more votes from the Tories than Labour (the British Election Study found that the second preference of Alliance voters was tilted pro-Tory rather than pro-Labour). Even proposing a poll tax wouldn't help - prior to its implementation, it actually got positive results in polls (I know - hard to imagine now!).

You'd need a different front man for Labour for a start - Michael Foot, for all his positive qualities, was a terrible leader for Labour. Even then, it's hard to see the British embracing the "suicide note" style manifesto.
 
Secondly Owen wins the SDP leadership and manges to cause a real crisis with Liberals, perhaps that no Liberal supporting independent nuclear disarmament be allowed to be a candidate

Well, there's no way David Steel would have allowed that to happen. Despite what Spitting Image would have us believe, Owen was not the dominant partner in the relationship and most of the insiders, I recall reading in a LibDem history piece on the SDP, made clear that Steel got his way more often than Owen did, at least to Bill Rodgers and Michael Meadowcroft.

Secondly, Owen knew the SDP would not be strong enough to stand without Liberal help in 1983. The reason most think he began to sour on the Alliance was because he felt that most of the winnable seats went to the Liberals, leaving the SDP targeting a lot of sure losses. But he had not soured on it until after Jenkins lost.
 
The Conservatives proposed the Poll Tax in 1987 and won a landslide.

Your best chance for a hard left Government is probably in the late seventies. where Michael Foot almost became Prime Minister and Argentina almost invaded the Falklands.
 

MAlexMatt

Banned
Contractionary fiscal policy is usually right-wing in nature, though it depends on the state of the economy.

I think that's a hard statement to make categorically. The left is often willing to raise taxes, sometimes to an insane degree.
 
Thoughts...

By definition, if someone like Healey had won the leadership, a Labour Government under his leadership would not have been "hard left" to use the expression.

Had the Falklands Campaign been a disaster with ships sunk, lives lost and the Argentineans still on the islands, it's hard to see how Thatcher could have survived but I think a more likely outcome from such an election is a Hung parliament with the Alliance parties in a strong position which would in itself mitigate against any "Hard left" Government.

I wonder what would have happened if the Westland Crisis of early 1986 had brought down the Government which isn't inconceivable. With the Tories in disarray, I could see Kinnock's Labour party doing very well but then again so would the Alliance.

A Labour victory in a 1991 or 1992 election possibly against a surviving Thatcher is much easier to imagine and while such a Government would be further to the Left than the Blair Government of OTL 1997 they would also be a long way from any Foot 1983 administration.

The only other possibility is for the 1979-81 economic and social policies to be far worse and divisive (perhaps an external factor creates a far deeper recession than in OTL) leading to a much stronger upsurge of rioting and disorder especially in the north and Scotland where manufacturing industry is ravaged and unemployment out of control.

Faced with this disorder, the Thatcher Government mobilises the Army and Emergency Powers but in a terrible incident in the Toxteth area of Liverpool, seven people are shot dead by the army for violating curfew even though they were subsequently found to be an immigrant family who had not realised a curfew was in effect.

The Home Secretary is forced to resign and a number of Conservative backbenchers, led by Ian Gilmour and James Prior, state they can no longer support the Government's economic and social policy. With their defection, Foot calls a vote of No Confidence which is won by three votes.

The General Election of October 1981 is a disaster for the Conservatives who lose 150 seats to both the Liberals and Labour. Foot finds himself leading a Labour Govenrment with a majority of 50 - Denis Healey becomes Foreign Secretary, Peter Shore the new Chancellor and Roy Hattersley the new Home Secretary.

An Emergency Budget reverses most of Howe's economic measures and imposes stringent new taxes on the wealthy and multinational companies. Foot announces the renunciation of Britain's nuclear deterrent and a plan to withdraw from the EEC.

Margaret Thatcher is removed from the leadership of the beaten Conservative Party and is replaced by Peter Walker.
 
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