Always on about Europe: British Political TL
- Thread starter Shads
- Start date
Well after much umming and erring I’ve decided to have another crack at this TL. However I’ll make a few alterations.
- I think we can all gather my knowledge on the ins and outs on Northern Irish and EU politics were a bit of a stumbling block and for that I apologise. Given the issues importance I believe Burnham would likely have tackled the Northern Irish referendum a little sooner than late ‘09 and as such a referendum would have taken place in around February of 2009 and the results of that would likely be a decisive victory for a customs union given Remain voters would have backed it as a way to stay closer to the EU and most brexiteers in order to avoid the issues of the troubles so around 69% in favour of the customs union and 31% opposed. The 31% mainly being hardcore brexiteers and those who would happily see Northern Ireland separated by an ocean.
-I think I also overestimated the ability of the BNP. While they haven’t won anything yet I think routinely scoring around 25% of the vote in by elections in seats where they have little to no local groundwork is too much. Whilst much of the UKIP remains joining them, moving to be more Thatcherite in ideology and a more pro brexit public would help them they don’t have the funding or local ground to score up totals like UKIP did in the 2010-2015 by elections. As such I am reducing their by election scores in Sherwood and Norwich to the mid teens although I stand by their performance in the 2009 EU Parliament election.
- I also have modified some of the events i had pre planned for the future but obviously I don’t wish to give the specifics away.
These changes are made in an effort to make the TL seem a little more realistic and while I’ll be the first to admit I haven’t exactly played it safe with some of my choices I would like to return some plausibility to it. Thank you immensely for showing interest in this over the summer and it really is what has brought me to return to this TL. Again, I apologise for my absence profusely but I hope you enjoy what is to come!
(I’ll modify some of the last by elections posts accordingly and I’ll have a new update out by this evening or tomorrow depending on how many cups of tea it takes.
)
- I think we can all gather my knowledge on the ins and outs on Northern Irish and EU politics were a bit of a stumbling block and for that I apologise. Given the issues importance I believe Burnham would likely have tackled the Northern Irish referendum a little sooner than late ‘09 and as such a referendum would have taken place in around February of 2009 and the results of that would likely be a decisive victory for a customs union given Remain voters would have backed it as a way to stay closer to the EU and most brexiteers in order to avoid the issues of the troubles so around 69% in favour of the customs union and 31% opposed. The 31% mainly being hardcore brexiteers and those who would happily see Northern Ireland separated by an ocean.
-I think I also overestimated the ability of the BNP. While they haven’t won anything yet I think routinely scoring around 25% of the vote in by elections in seats where they have little to no local groundwork is too much. Whilst much of the UKIP remains joining them, moving to be more Thatcherite in ideology and a more pro brexit public would help them they don’t have the funding or local ground to score up totals like UKIP did in the 2010-2015 by elections. As such I am reducing their by election scores in Sherwood and Norwich to the mid teens although I stand by their performance in the 2009 EU Parliament election.
- I also have modified some of the events i had pre planned for the future but obviously I don’t wish to give the specifics away.
These changes are made in an effort to make the TL seem a little more realistic and while I’ll be the first to admit I haven’t exactly played it safe with some of my choices I would like to return some plausibility to it. Thank you immensely for showing interest in this over the summer and it really is what has brought me to return to this TL. Again, I apologise for my absence profusely but I hope you enjoy what is to come!
(I’ll modify some of the last by elections posts accordingly and I’ll have a new update out by this evening or tomorrow depending on how many cups of tea it takes.
)A Very British (National) Coup
August 2009 - Millibank, CCHQ
Michael Howard: William, we must iron out these holes in our strategy. As Party Chairman, it’s my job to put forward our campaign in the next election. I can’t do that if we continue dawdling with this indecisiveness!
William Hague: Quite right, Michael, quite right. Do we have a consensus on our electoral strategy yet? Cameron?
David Cameron: Well, if I may argue again for my plan. Studies have been pointing to a large overlap in policy with the Liberals and a smaller but still notable one with the SDP. The Economy, Education, the Environment to name a few!
David Davis: I must agree with David here, the Liberals are our natural allies. If only we had courted them before.
Chris Grayling: There is far more potential in trying to win the centre ground than there is drifting to the fringes of the right.
Michael Gove: You would say that, wouldn’t you? Given your little stint in the SDP.
William Hague: That comment really wasn’t necessary, Michael. Anyway, I see the point you’re all making but how do we know they’ll come back to us? They have the choice between the SDP and the Liberals. Hell, some of them are still voting Labour. Why would they opt for us?
Boris Johnson: Ah! But that’s the point! They aren’t natural Liberal or SDP voters, per say. We’ve well... scared them off, Osborne wasn’t exactly the right chap to win them back because it was too close to 2000 still. If we put on a proper fresh coat of paint, stick to our guns and dare the awkward squad to face us down, I reckon we’d be in for a good chance.
Jacob Rees-Mogg: I voted to leave, I stand by that decision. Enthral me as to why I should support this.
David Cameron: I assure you, we would make concessions in other areas. Besides, we aren’t advocating to remain here. Just a few sweeteners to make our deal seem like the better option for those that voted Remain whilst keeping committed to leaving.
Michael Gove: The next election isn’t until 2012! It’ll be too late to do any of this!
David Cameron: That’s what makes it better. We can say these Liberal friendly things now but that doesn’t mean we’ll get the chance to act on them and split the voters like a BNP electoral pact would.
Michael Howard: I do see the logic in that. By “a fresh coat of paint” I presume you mean a new leader?
David Cameron: Well, yes.... not that I wish to hurry you along William.
William Hague: No, don’t worry. I understand what you’re saying. Besides, I’ve been in the Shadow Cabinet in some capacity for nearly 15 years now. It’ll be nice to have a break on the backbenches. I’ll resign early next year, hopefully my last conference helps me go out on a positive note.
Michael Howard: I’m sure it will, now. Let’s vote on David’s proposals, albeit with a slightly more subtle approach. All in favour say aye?
For: 17
Abstain: 2 (Rees-Mogg and Gove)
Against: 1 (Iain Duncan-Smith)
The News of the motion quickly filtered it’s way down to the backbenches. Farage was furious at the near unanimous rejection of his plan for a BNP electoral pact. His support amongst the backbenches, although not as strong as previously, still gave him the loyalty of several mps. Deciding that his second chance for the Conservative party had been misguided, he rounded up his supporters and called for a defection to the BNP in protest of this apparent “betrayal” by the leadership. In the end however only a few followed him.
Late August 2009: Conservative defectors to the BNP
Nigel Farage (South Thanet)
Mark Reckless (Rochester and Strood)
Paul Nuttall (South Holland and the Deepings)
Steve Crowther (Torridge and West Devon)
These defections took the Conservatives to 222 mps however, as many more had been expected like the SDP before, actually helped to undermine the BNP in this case. Nevertheless, the BNP were jubilant at this news and Nick Griffin held a victory speech in Barking, a target seat for the party. However, the speech was met with an organised anti-BNP group heckling Griffin from the back. The crowd quickly turned violent on eachother and prove were forced to be sent in in order to quell the conflict. While Griffin was being escorted away from the scene, a man egged him and in a moment of stupidity and rage the BNP leader resorted to violence to deal with this egger. The man was caught off guard by Griffin lunging at him and several BNP supporters nearby also joined in on this attack. The man was critically injured from the beating and the aftermath did not look good for the party on what should have been a time to show off their 4 new mps. Robert Kilroy-Silk, who had been building up his influence in the party along with ally Tim Congdon, seized the opportunity and called for a vote of no confidence in Griffins leadership of the party. The influence of the two men, the incident that had occurred and the influx of Thatcherites to the party allowed the vote to decisively pass in favour of the vote of no confidence. Kilroy-Silk moved quickly and secured himself and Congdon as leader and deputy leader respectively. Farage had actually been plotting with the two men to dethrone Griffin for several months now. Farage had previously refused to join the party as long as Griffin remained leader although the situation turned out in his favour after he chose to defect anyway. With the rise of the Thatcherites to the leadership came a further expulsion of fascists from the party including, eventually, Griffin himself on the grounds of “poor conduct”. The old BNP had been toppled, but much more was to come for this new leadership.
Conference Season
As the amount of parties receiving the spotlight treatment in Britain grew the yearly conferences only grew in length and scale. Labour came first with their conference, located this year in Bristol. As the party in government they gave generally well received but not substantial speeches on their progress in the last year. Ed Balls speech on the economy was generally regarded to be the best as he coined the term “a steady ship of social decency” to describe the Labour term so far which was quickly picked up as an unofficial paddy slogan. However they were quickly overshadowed by those of the other parties.
In a widely satirised move, the Liberal and SDP conferences overlapped on one day with Spitting Image portraying David Laws’ puppet as saying “The choice is very clear. You can stay here and listen to the party of the good honest centre ground or go to Brighton for the party of the good honest centre ground.”. The Liberals “keynote” speech was headed by Nick Clegg after his recent by election victory in Norwich, proclaiming the ruthless Liberal by election machine was up and running once again as well as committing to winning more mp’s in the next election by winning back lost ground. YellowBlack protests for greater recognition led by the Young Liberals did cause some small scale disruption of the conference and some awkward glances from the hall. The SDP meanwhile focused their conference on deriding Labour’s “draconian” Brexit policy as well as a talk on the environment led by ex Vice President Al Gore. The SDP also announced possible regional electoral pacts with Plaid Cymru and the SNP in future elections due to policy agreements in many areas. Labour’s most recent election campaigns had wounded the nationalist parties to just 2 and 4 seats respectively. Their hope was a combined effort would see a success for the parties with the SDP’s new commitment to “progressive devolution” in which Wales and Scotland would be granted extra powers.
The Conservative party conference followed after quite neatly give their big announcement. William Hague confirmed the new position of the Conservatives as a “business-first Brexit” committed to safeguarding economic interests. Other important speeches led by David Cameron and Eric Pickles respectively focused on sending out feelers to the Liberal and Social Democratic parties in a subtle enough way as to simply appear as a policy agreement rather than a full blown offer of cooperation.
“At that time it was important to consider the relative uneasiness of some in the conference hall. Of course, we still have many traditional conservatives in our party and it was necessary to keep them on side and not seem as if we had suddenly lurched towards the centre. I still believe doing just that is what caused Blair to only last 6 years. You can’t lurch one way or another in politics without serious repercussions.”
- David Cameron in his book “Lessons for the 2020s” published in 2021
The defection of 4 mps to the BNP had brought unexpected attention to the party conference and indeed, the conference itself had to be completely reworked after the Kilroy-Silk/Congdon coup of the party. The two men laid out their policies for the future as well as each of the 4 mps giving speeches, with Farage not all holding back his disdain for the new shift of the Conservative Party. Although many in the conference sang their praises to Margaret Thatcher the iron lady remained silent on the issue entirely. Speeches on immigration did give the party their usual media buzz, some supportive and others not so fond.
Opinions polls throughout conference season had the expected consistency of each party getting a boost from their conference. However, after these differences began to settle down it emerged that both the Conservatives and Labour had lost ground to the minor parties in a drastic way. The irregularities of first past the post meant a score like this could throw up some insane results. The poll also showed other successes with the two nationalist parties winning back some former ground.
Poll of Polls: 1st-20th October 2009 (Excludes Northern Ireland)
Conservative: 27%
Labour: 26%
Liberal: 19%
SDP: 16%
BNP: 8%
SNP: 2%
Plaid Cymru: 1%
Others: 1%
Three Men and a Poll
Ever since the splintering of the Democratic Party, the Liberals had been trading blows with the SDP as the status for Britain’s third place party. For most of this time the SDP would edge them out due to its decisive rejection of the referendum being good fodder for disheartened remain voters. The SDP however lacked the ground game that the Liberals held in many seats as well as party funding. Upon the split of the party the Liberals took much of the businesses that supported the Democratic Party with it, likely due to their more pro-business attitudes.
These factors were finally starting to pay off as they opened up a consistent poll lead of 3-5% over the SDP throughout much of late 2009 with some polls even putting the party over the all important 20% threshold that would see the party start to once again make major inroads into many crucial seats. The poll results were a jubilation for the three leading figures of the Liberal Party. Of course David Laws, the Leader, being the first followed by Nick Clegg in his newly captured seat of Norwich North was now running the show of the economic policy for the Liberals as well as being a popular face on tv for many. Danny Alexander completed the trio however unlike Clegg and Laws he had yet to regain a seat after losing his seat of Inverness, Nairn, Badenoch and Strathspey to a successful Labour challenger following the near wipeout of the Liberals in Scotland. Alexander was however eyeing his chances at the upcoming Glasgow North East by election, triggered by Labour backbencher Michael Martin resigning his seat following an expenses investigation as the final echoes of the scandal came to a close. In the last general election the Liberals had narrowly beat out the SNP and SDP in a close fought battle for second place which had inadvertently allowed Martin to increase his majority but now with the Labour and Conservative parties at their worse combined showing for some time in opinion polls the minor parties were all hopeful of the damage they could do to Labour in one of their safest seats in the country.
Following their electoral alliances with the nationalist parties during conference season, the SDP agreed to stand aside and endorse a vote for the Scottish nationalists which gave Alex Salmonds party some much needed hope. The Liberals launched their tried and tested by-election flooding tactics with a flurry of posters and door to door knockers and received a better than expected response in Glasgow especially after their predecessor parties dealings with the Conservatives. The day of the by election came and the people of Glasgow voted on a better than expected turnout.
Glasgow North-East by-election results
Turnout: 47.1%
Labour - Willie Bain: 10,745 41.5% -17.3%
Liberal - Danny Alexander: 6,447 24.9% +13.0%
SNP - Billy McAllister: 5,101 19.7% +8.1%
BNP - Walter Hamilton: 1,890 7.3% +7.3%
Independent - John Smeaton: 855 3.3% +3.3%
Conservative - Jack Wylie: 829 3.2% -3.3%
Scottish Socialist - Angus Berrington 26 0.1% -1.6%
Result: Labour HOLD: Majority of 16.6%
Despite the energetic campaigns of both the Scottish Nationalist Party and the Liberal Party the sheer strength of Labour in Glasgow. When the result was announced there was much sniping between the two that their combined vote share would have been able to topple Labour but ultimately the blame game would go nowhere for either party. Although Labour had held their seat there were a few uneasy whispers at their 17.3% loss in the vote share however the fact that Glasgow North East was still comfortably a safe seat staved off such murmurs. The Conservatives meanwhile were left embarrassed by their performance in the seat. While Glasgow wasn’t exactly a bastion of conservatism it was not an encouraging result to come 5th behind both the BNP and John Smeaton, a man made famous for kicking a terrorist in the testicles. The BNP had also retained their deposit which was especially disheartening for the Tories as Scotland was not the BNPs most fertile soil either and yet they had lost their deposit with a measly 800 votes to show for it, certainly showing that the jubilation at the Conservatives placing first in opinion polls for the first time since 2007 had its limits. The party did reassure themselves however that they would be reinvigorated with a new leader. With Hague set to depart in early 2010, who would be the person to take the Conservatives into the new decade?
A Chilly Start
The beginning of 2010 was met by the coldest winter the U.K. had seen since 1981-1982. The already stagnating U.K. economy did not take the rough winter well and gdp made a notable 0.2% loss over that quarter. Burnham and Labour was not faring well from this announcement as the governments lacking response to the crisis in some areas was criticised and sunk lower in opinion polls because of this.
Poll of Polls: January-March 2010 (Excludes Northern Ireland)
Conservative: 32%
Labour: 24%
Liberal: 21%
SDP: 13%
BNP: 6%
SNP: 2%
Plaid Cymru: 1%
Others: 1%
The poll lead of 8% from the winter fallout gave the Conservatives some much needed renewed optimism. William Hague believed his party could capitalise on this with a new leader and pushed forward his resignation, announcing his departure on the 27th of March with a leadership election to take place throughout April. While many were celebrating some Tory higher ups warned that the poll lead would needed to be maintained for another 2 years.
“We do have much to celebrate at this moment and I’m thankful for the return to good fortune. You don’t win elections solely on the weather being chilly.”
- Michael Howard, Conservative Party Chairman, on Question Time responding to Tory leads in opinion polls.
After Hague announced his departure Tories began announcing their candidacy. The first to throw his hat in the ring was the widely expected David Cameron bid. Cameron of course came from the more liberal wing of the Conservative Party and, unlike Osborne years prior, seemed to be much more well rounded and capable of getting past his Etonian background. Originally, the Leadership election had been looking to be a sew up between Cameron and Farage but after his departure to the BNP the contest was thrown wide open. Representing the closest to Farage’s ideas, John Redwood put his name forward hoping to make up for his catastrophic losses in 1995 and 1997 and quickly received the endorsement of shadow cabinet members Jacob Rees-Mogg and Iain Duncan-Smith. Andrea Leadsom would follow, declaring the need for a women leader to represent change and taking a moderate viewpoint similar to Hague’s. Jeremy Hunt too stood on a moderate viewpoint but was quickly mocked when he stumbled on his words in his announcement speech and referred to the Conservative Party as “a bunch of tossers” while he was trying to highlight the image problems the party had. David Davis, believing his position as Shadow Chancellor could help springboard himself to the leadership would also announce his candidacy on a strictly libertarian stance on most matters. Greg Knight and David Davies, the shadow Scottish and Welsh Secretaries respectively, would run in a bizarre joint candidacy idea, declaring it was “time power was no longer centralised into one prime minister”. Finally, the beloved hero of the Tory membership, Eric Pickles decided to put his name forward one last time after much debate. What had started as an upcoming two horse race had become a 7 (or 8 if you include both gentlemen in the joint candidacy) person playing field for the top spot. With no clear uniting figure, who would be the Tory to take the crown?
Last edited:
Tories at the Top Spot
The heated campaigning for Conservative leader kicked off with a slew of endorsements for each candidate. Cameron was by far the bookies favourite to win given his wide appeal and presentable image to the electorate as someone to combat the youth of Burnham. Who would take second place and advance to the members ballot was anyone’s guess. Davis, Pickles, Redwood and surprisingly the joint candidacy of Knight and Davies would all pick up some steam. For all intensive purposes however Knight was running on his own due to the rules of the leadership selection process. The first MP ballot arrived and 222 MPs would decide who would be first out.
2010 Conservative Party Leadership Election: First Round
David Cameron: 76 34.2%
David Davis: 61 27.5%
Eric Pickles: 24 10.8%
John Redwood: 21 9.5%
Greg Knight: 19 8.6%
Andrea Leadsom: 11 4.9%
Jeremy Hunt: 10 4.5%
The first round saw Cameron cruise to a solid third of the party support already and things were looking good for him with the battle seeming to be emerging into a Cameron vs Davis matchup. Jeremy Hunt was eliminated after his campaign had never got off the ground. Despite only receiving the endorsement of one more MP, Leadsom stubbornly refused to pull out the race. With her candidacy likely unable to go anywhere her supporters drifted elsewhere which would ultimately prove to be the turning point of the campaign.
2010 Conservative Party Leadership Election: Second Round
David Davis: 77 34.6%
David Cameron: 76 34.2%
Eric Pickles: 25 11.3%
John Redwood: 20 9.0%
Greg Knight: 19 8.6%
Andrea Leadsom: 5 2.6%
By securing the support of Hunts MPs as well as a sizeable amount of Leadsom’s, Davis had narrowly beaten Cameron for first place. Cameron had been hopping for one or two of Hunt’s crew to jump onto his ship just to keep his numbers up but he hadn’t moved an inch! Panicking about the result all day, it wasn’t until a fateful call later that evening that Cameron would have his answer.
*phone rings*
David Cameron: Hello?
Eric Pickles: Evening, David.
David Cameron: Ah, Eric! I suspect you wish to talk about today’s ballot?
Eric Pickles: Yes, it’s not good news is it?
David Cameron: Indeed, Leadsom’s, Redwoods and likely most of Knight’s supporters seem more likely to back Davis than me.
Eric Pickles: and how do you think you’ll do at the Membership ballot?
David Cameron: I’m really not sure, what do you think?
Eric Pickles: I’ll be honest, I don’t think you’ll do well. A lot of the party still think you would drag us back into the EU!
David Cameron: Yes, but I...
Eric Pickles: I’m not saying I think you would. I’m just saying that’s how people perceive you. Which is why I have a proposition for you.
David Cameron: And what is that?
Eric Pickles: Stand aside in favour of me, I’ll win the membership ballot. You’ll be my right hand man, Shadow Chancellor. You can campaign with me and make sure you stand out as your own man while equally getting past that reputation you have currently. We will win 2012, I’ll serve a term, one term, no more than that. And by 2016 you can take over from me and do what you like, you’re young still, whose to say what you’ll be able to do?
David Cameron: How can you be so sure we’ll win the next one? Sure, Burnham isn’t looking to good right now but he always recovers.
Eric Pickles: Well we won’t win if bloody Davis gets in. He may take us up to 240-250 odd seats but you don’t form a government on that. I can get us a majority, David.
David Cameron: But how?
Eric Pickles: I’ll tell you about it tomorrow. But for now I have to make sure this works.
David Cameron: Ok, I’ll talk to you more about this tomorrow.
2010 Conservative Party Leadership Election: Third Round
Eric Pickles: 93 41.4%
David Davis: 79 35.6%
John Redwood: 25 11.5%
Greg Knight: 25 11.5%
Following this, Knight and Redwood would both drop out as it was evident who would be progressing to the membership vote. In a televised debate Pickles spoke of his ability to capture a broader electorate and “look past the narrow line that we have decided are ‘Conservative’” whilst Davis tried to tilt himself towards the economic policy of the Liberals. It was however Pickles’ popularity amongst the party members that would decide who emerged on top.
2010 Conservative Party Leadership Election: Members Vote
Eric Pickles: 131,265 67.5%
David Davis: 63,202 32.5%
Eric Pickles had been catapulted from MP for Brentwood and Ongar, to government minister in Hague’s brief spell in power, to Shadow Home Secretary and now to the Leadership. He had no time to lose and quickly announced his new shadow cabinet, with a promotion for his new partner in Crime.
2010 Shadow Cabinet of Eric Pickles
Leader of the Opposition: Eric Pickles
Shadow Chancellor: David Cameron
Shadow Foreign Secretary: Rory Stewart
Shadow Home Secretary: Greg Knight
Conservative Party Chairman: Michael Howard
Shadow Defence: Jacob Rees-Mogg
Shadow Health: Andrea Leadsom
Shadow Education and Employment: Michael Gove
Shadow Justice: Liam Fox
Shadow Business: George Osborne
Shadow Trade and Industry: Phillip Hammond
Shadow Food, Fisheries and Agriculture: Wilfred Emmanuel-Jones
Shadow Environment: Caroline Spelman
Shadow Communities and Local Government: Andrew Mitchell
Shadow Culture, Olympics and Sport: Theresa Villiers
Shadow Transport: Boris Johnson
Shadow International Development: Jeremy Hunt
Shadow Scottish: Chris Grayling
Shadow Welsh: David Davies
Shadow Northern Irish: Reg Empey
The reshuffle promoted some new faces to the table. Including the first Black member of the Conservative Cabinet in Wilfred Emmanuel-Jones, mp for Devizes since 2008. Hefty promotions also came for Greg Knight and Rory Stewart in order to consolidate the Conservative base as well as the return of Osborne to the shadow cabinet. Eric Pickles was ready to tackle the Labour government in his own unique style, would his plan succeed though!
Late April 2010: William Hague’s house
“Eric Pickles” the now former Conservative leader chuckled to himself, “of all people, Eric Pickles.”.
He was of course aware of the backroom deal between him and Cameron, it was an open secret in an almost exact same way to Blair and Brown’s. Would it end up the same way for them though? With Pickles winning a thumping majority only to resign in shame at a flopped war vote? Cameron then stepping up the podium only to lose it in the most bizarre election for a few generations? Of course, Brown had lost to him. It was certainly a strange thought, he never really felt like an ex-Prime Minister. He turned his attention to the new tv Ffion had bought him, they were getting smaller and smaller these days. He remembered when a TV was a big box that took up a fifth of the room. On the high quality image showed BBC news footage of Eric Pickles celebrating his leadership victory, shaking hands with some rather excited looking Conservative members. It had been a while since he’d garnered that sort of reaction. With a brief flash of envy he thought to himself, “Everything I wanted to be...” before taking a sip of water and returning to his book.
Last edited:
A New Face
Once Eric Pickles had ascended to the leadership and performed his reshuffle, there came the important matter of distinguishing himself from previous Conservative Leaders. Being from a Labour supporting family background, he acknowledged the pull of Labour to many of those less well off and had himself even flirted with hard left political groups in his youth. It was on these ideas that he based his first major policy speech as leader.
“When I took the position of leader I swore to look beyond what we have narrowly classed as ‘Conservative’ in the past few years. The strange thing is, we don’t have to look too far! We in the Conservative Party have looked too often to Margaret Thatcher and Winston Churchill. And while they have of course earned their place in Conservative thought I hope I can encourage a revitalisation of one of our greatest former prime ministers, Harold Macmillan.
As prime minister, he embraced what we now refer to as “compassionate conservatism”. He embraced the welfare state at a time where many in our party ran fleeing from it! I believe it is high time we do the same! These nationalisation efforts by Labour have proven both popular and successful, we would be seen as quite inflexible to just return them to the private sector again. I understand this viewpoint may stir tensions in the party but I believe it is a necessary change for us if we want to be trusted by the British people with the keys to power ever again!”
- Eric Pickles speaking to a Conservative Club in early May of 2010.
This ‘Macmillanisation’ of the party as the press dubbed it certainly drew both support and opposition from Conservative benches. Many even in Pickles shadow cabinet were at best lukewarm to the proposals however the leader of the opposition settled the right of his party down a little with commitments to extra spending on security and matching the 2% NATO military spending. The local elections proved an immediate test of Pickles policies and luckily for him the results were favourable. Particular success came in the London Boroughs where Conservatives captured the previously Labour held Harrow, Ealing and Enfield councils as well as Richmond from the Liberal Party due to vote splitting between Liberals and the SDP. Across the country Conservatives were also able to turn Swindon, Woking, Lincoln and Carlisle blue in a flurry of narrow gains. Labour suffered greatly compared to the last election in 2006, a fairly successful year for Gordon Brown, and a searing blow for Burnham just as he had been preparing to put forward his bill suggested last year for an increase in MPs from 650 to 700. This, combined with continuing backlash from expenses at mps, caused Burnham to u-turn and shelve plans for an increase in seats, sticking with the most recent boundaries for the 2012 general election.
The biggest embarrassment for Labour in the local elections took place in Barking where the BNP were able to narrowly top Labour in Seats. While the council was still left in No Overall Control and the two SDP councillors helped Labour retain control, it was a shock to the party at a time that only helped exacerbate their weak point.
As for the other Minor parties, the Liberals held up far better than had been expected from the heady days of the Democratic Party. While a drop in councillors and councils had been guaranteed the losses were not as bad as many pundits had excepted. The SDP, due to this, did not make a major breakthrough and was only able to hold onto some of its defections after the split as well as not maintaining the control of any councils. Laws could breathe a sigh of relief but for Hames it was a sign that perhaps the chaos of the EU referendum and the calls for remain were starting to die down as the U.K. was set to leave in just a few months.
Last edited:
I believe you’re thinking of someone else. Besides a small expenses claim, he seems to be pretty clean.
He failed to uncover a child abuse scandal while he was Sec of State for communities and local government OTL but obviously that has been butterflied away given Labour is in power.
Fight for Revival
Poll of Polls: April-May 2010 (Scotland Only)
Labour: 34%
Scottish National Party: 23%
SDP: 18%
Liberal: 10%
Conservative: 10%
BNP: 2%
Others: 3%
With the embarrassment of Glasgow North East hot on the heels of many Scottish Tories, many began to consider Fraser’s radical proposal. Endorsements from south of the border also came with Michael Gove claiming the idea would “breathe new life” into the Conservatives hopes in Scotland. The most senior endorsement came from Eric Pickles himself who praised Fraser for being “brave and forward-thinking”. These endorsements would see Fraser narrowly top Goldie in the poll to become the new leader of the Scottish Conservatives.
Scottish Conservative Leadership Election: 21st May 2010
Murdo Fraser: 2,873 54.3%
Annabel Goldie: 2,417 45.7%
Upon his election as Leader, Fraser would soon afterwards arrange meetings with Pickles and others at Conservative HQ to put through his plan of separation of the two parties. With Pickles blessing, the Scottish Unionist Party or just simply “the Unionists” was born. The party was free to set it’s own policies north of the border but, like their Northern Irish counterparts, would take a looser version of the Conservative Whip in Westminster. Although Labour was quick to criticise the move as “the same old with a new coat of paint”, Fraser was confident the Unionists would show their strength in the 2011 Scottish Parliament Election and the 2012 General Election following it. In this make or break moment, would the strange death of Tory Scotland be saved from the brink?
Kicked while they’re down
With Labour continuing to lose support to the fresh new Conservative leadership, the Hampstead and Kilburn by election couldn’t have come at a worse time for them. Glenda Jackson, who had held the seat previously with a 7.9% majority, had passed away at the age of 74 and her seat was now up for grabs.
Both the Conservative and Liberal parties launched large aggressive campaigns to snatch the seat from Labour’s clutches. Labour, the SDP and the BNP would all also be standing but they would be much more low-key in their efforts. The BNP was aware this inner London seat was not a place for their best performances and would not drum up the same door knockers as they had in the more Brexit voting northernly seats. The Liberals, as the Democratic Party, had won the Seat in 2007 but was hoping their by election machine would help them capture it once again. Labour’s choice of Tulip Siddiq was seen as a fairly safe choice of a candidate from the soft left of the party. Rumours of a liberal upset for the Conservatives plagued the campaign as their activists descended upon the seat. It was however the momentum of Eric Pickles and the relentless campaigner of David Cameron in the Seat that decided the result.
Hampstead and Kilburn by-Election results
Conservative - Chris Philp: 11,834 34.1% +2.0%
Liberal - Edward Fordham: 10,932 31.5% +9.6%
Labour - Tulip Siddiq: 8,260 23.8% -16.2%
SDP - Peter May: 1,805 5.2% +5.2%
BNP - Victoria Moore: 541 1.3% +1.3%
Others: 1,423 4.1%
Conservative GAIN from Labour
Majority: 2.6%
The result was a cause for celebration for almost every party bar Labour and the BNP. For the Conservatives they were able to take their total back up to 223 MPs and show that their new leader could make them competitive in London once again. For the Liberals the seat was now certainly a 2012 target with a tiny majority to overcome. The SDP proved themselves able to keep their deposit even in a seat that they had not stood in last time. For Labour, another collapse in the vote share scared many in the party at the thought of not securing a second term. Rumours began to emerge that David Miliband , the standard bearer of the currently neglected but still powerful Blairite wing of the party, was planning to confront Burnham about these losses and perhaps even a leadership challenge. To Burnham’s benefit however, it was notoriously difficult to coup a standing Labour leader against their will. People could only speculate how these internal divisions play out and plague the party going forward.
Laws’ Summer Scandal
In late May of 2010, it emerged that David Laws, the Liberal Party leader, had been spending the last year trying to cover up and bury an expenses scandal that now threatened unravel his carefully crafted political position. He had been claiming expenses in order to pay the rent for his partners apartment. This had totalled to almost £40,000 over five years and was not taken lightly by the presses following its emergence. Both Tory and Labour papers were trampling over each other to denounce Laws and call for his resignation. Indeed, there were even some amongst his own party saying that it would be for the best. For a Liberal Party that had escaped the worst sniping of expenses to drudge the topic back up was not good coverage. It wasn’t until an early June poll however that revealed how dire the straits had become.
YouGov Opinion Poll: June 1st-June 5th (Excludes NI)
Conservative: 35%
Labour: 28%
SDP: 18%
Liberal: 12%
BNP: 4%
SNP: 2%
Plaid Cymru: 1%
After nearly half a year of decisive leads over the SDP, by election near misses and making Labour sweat in more than one occasion, the Liberals had been reduced back to their post 2008 election low point. During the time of high opinion polls, the party had set a target of 50+ seats on around 20% of the vote but now these new results suggested the party even may take a further step backwards. This was greatly to the benefit of the Conservatives who were now certainly looking at the possibility of a majority, something they had been trying to achieve for nearly 18 years now.
Laws therefore came to the difficult decision to resign, in hopes another leader could restore hope to the Liberals in achieving the results it had gotten in the days of Davey and Wheway. Now with a seat to his name, Nick Clegg was quickly deemed the frontrunner in the race however some warned his close ties to Laws may hurt him if another strong contender emerged. Although rumours of a Clarke candidacy never amounted to anything it was well known an endorsement from such a high profile figure could catapult someone’s campaign into energisation.
This was just the case when Clarke gave his blessing to Alistair Carmichael, one of the Liberals two remaining MPs in Scotland alongside Ming Campbell. Campbell too have his endorsement of Carmichael as someone who could broaden the appeal of the Liberals by positioning themselves closer to the centre whilst maintaining the idealogical beliefs that had first emerged in 1999. Campbell’s successor to the North East Fife Seat was the widely touted future star of the Liberals, Edinburgh Councillor Ruth Davidson, also gave her blessing to his campaign. A third candidate would emerge in North Devon MP Nick Harvey who would use his long service to the party, being an MP since 1992, to question the supposed inexperience of Clegg. With Sarah Teather also vacating the Deputy Leader position, how would the Liberals restructure themselves for the future?
Doesn't that wikibox of the results show them continuing the 5 tests?
Also I just wanted to say this is one of the best timelines centering around modern politics I have ever read.
Last edited:
Oh, my mistake. I somehow got yes and no mixed up when I was making the wikibox, I do apologise.
Thank you, that’s most kind of you to say. I’m sorry for my lack of updates again, I’m afraid it’s that old chestnut of writers block.