alternatehistory.com

This is just a small TL about small British political parties and how they could be more succesful. Nothing huge and it focuses on '97 onwards.
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Part One: The 'Right' Swing
The 1997 General Election was an odd one, Britain was finally throwing the Conservatives out of power after they'd been in for 18 long years. However it wasn't just a time for a large-scale change in the larger political climate, there were a number of smaller parties that began to appear either through large votes or even in one case through a seat in the Commons.

The seat in the Commons was in West Bromwich and had been previously occupied by the Speaker Betty Boothroyd. The vote was split between her, Richard Silvester (Ind. Labour) and Arthur Scargill (Socialist Labour Party)[1]. This mass-splitting of the vote led to Steven Edwards of the National Democrat Party (NDP) win a seat in Parliament, the NDP being a heavily nationalist party.[2] While the constituency was abnormal in that it was a Speakers seat the it did lead to a substantial number of people joining the NDP, some rejoining after having left before while others came from the National Front (NF) and British National Party (BNP).

Alongside this the BNP did quite well votes-wise, as in two constituencies the BNP managed to beat the Liberal Democrats votes. These were in Bethnal Green and Bow (David King) and Poplar and Canning Town (John Tyndall). With these successes for the two far-right parties some believed that they should merge to form a single party, thus drawing on the money of a much larger pool of members. However Ian Anderson (NDP) and John Tyndall (BNP) didn't get on, thus such a merger would have to wait some years.[3]

However not all the focus of the 1997 General Election should go to the near-extreme far-right. The 'Referendum Party' that supported a referendum on the UK's membership of the EU fielded 547 candidates and got around 811,000 votes making it the fourth-largest party by votes. Sir James Goldsmith (the leader of the party) vowed that the party would continue, while there was a mild hiccup along the way when he had a heart attack which he recovered from quickly.[4]

The United Kingdom Independence Party (UKIP) fielded 193 candidates and they gained around 105,000 votes. This rather poor performance has been put down to the existance of the Referendum Party. Because of this the leader of UKIP (Dr Alan Sked) began talks with Sir James Goldsmith (Referendum party) about a possible merger.

In December of 1997 the Referendum Party merged with UKIP after much debate. Most members of both parties stayed within the party (it adopted the name of the Party of Democracy (PoD)). The leader of the party was Sir James Goldsmith and the Chairman was Michael Holmes, Dr Alan Sked left the party soon after the merger as he believed the party was still "doomed to remain on the political fringes". He joined the Conservative Party not long after.

[1] - IOTL Arthur Scargill stood in Southern Wales.

[2] - On a side note an election for a new Speaker of the Commons was held and Sir George Young (North West Hampshire) of the Conservatives won.

[3] - This dislike is mere speculation.

[4] - IOTL Sir James Goldsmith died from this, not long afterward his Referendum Party dissolved into a pressure group.
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