Margaret Thatcher not "assassinated"

[Basileus Giorgios]

What if Margaret Thatcher was not politically "assassinated" by Michael Heseltine and friends in late 1990? How would the 1991/92 and 96/97 elections have turned out?
I'd guess small Labour majority in '92, followed by Tory return in 1997... How about you?

 

[Reekwind]

What if Margaret Thatcher was not politically "assassinated" by Michael Heseltine and friends in late 1990? How would the 1991/92 and 96/97 elections have turned out?

With her still at the head of the Tories? Correct me if I'm wrong but wasn't Thatcher politically bankrupt and desperately unpopular with the country at large at the time of her "assassination"?

Of course it was the scandal years of the early 90s that really made the Tories unelectable for the next decade. So maybe the 'Iron Lady' losing the '92 election would be the best thing for the party. Ideally you'd have this defeat spark off a small revolution in the party, getting it to clean up its act, but then you'd have to figure that it would just lead to Heseltine et al staging their coup a year or two later than in OTL

 

[stevep]

With her still at the head of the Tories? Correct me if I'm wrong but wasn't Thatcher politically bankrupt and desperately unpopular with the country at large at the time of her "assassination"?

Of course it was the scandal years of the early 90s that really made the Tories unelectable for the next decade. So maybe the 'Iron Lady' losing the '92 election would be the best thing for the party. Ideally you'd have this defeat spark off a small revolution in the party, getting it to clean up its act, but then you'd have to figure that it would just lead to Heseltine et al staging their coup a year or two later than in OTL

I agree. She was still totally committed to the poll tax at the time. I can remember her complaining that it was unpopular because the Tory party wasn't getting the message across and we, as Liberals, were quietly chucking that that was exactly why it was so unpopular.

By that time the Thatcher Reaction had very much run out of steam and also just about out of anything to flog off to keep its policies even looking like working. 'New' Labour had a bout of look in the economic position worldwide to continue similar ones and also the tail end of the so called peace dividend from the end of the cold war. However both of them wasted so much resources on [FONT=&quot]bureaucracies [/FONT]and bonuses to their friends.

Steve

 

[Marky Bunny]

It would have taken only two people to change for not voting to voting for her and she wins on the first ballot. But even so she would have been wounded, and finished. She may have got a boost from the Gulf War at the start of 1991, and she said she would gone to the country in June 1991. I think people where still very un-certain about Kinnock (alot more than people are now about Cameron), and you could have a hung parliament, I don't there would have been a labour landslide like 1997.

 

[V-J]

I think people where still very un-certain about Kinnock (alot more than people are now about Cameron), and you could have a hung parliament,

Oh, I'm sure Labour would have won, and reasonably comfortably. (Not over a hundred or anywhere near, but certainly decisively.) Thatcher was desperately unpopular at this point. Desperately. Please remember, she would be going into this hypothetical election with a commitment to retaining the Poll Tax. (Unless, in her weakness, someone can force her to abandon it - good luck)

Agree in respect of the inevitability of her doom by '89/'90. Even if she had won, it would have been a technical victory. She'd have either been challeneged again the following year, 'pressured' out by the Cabinet (unlikely but possible if a head of steam builds up) or (probably the more palatable option for her) clung on for dear life until the end of Iraq to take the party down to electoral defeat with her, if neccessary.

In the short term, it would have been a disaster for the Tories, but in the long-term, I suspect it would be to their benefit.