Nwefoundland votes for Union with the UK

Prior to incorporation with the Canadian Union Attlee appointed Sir Gordon Macdonald as the last Governor General with the brief of persuading Newfoundlanders to vote to join Canada and getting a debt ridden colony under administration since 1934 off Britain's hands. Macdonald had begun his career as a miner and had become a Labour M.P and had been a regional administrator for fuel and power in the Second World War. After Newfoundland joined the union he returned to Britain and was elevated to a peerage and appointed Paymaster general.

However the Newfoundlanders had asked for administration in 1934 and might have considered the option of seeking to join the United Kingdom had it been available. Malta had at a subsequent date considered joining the UK when Dom Mintoff had his first period at Prime Minister but it was rejexted. At an time when the post war government was about to start decolonising it may have been an embarassment but could Newfoundland have paved the way for a few other small colonies although on the verge of bankrupcy its territory also included much of Labrador with potential mineral wealth. What would have happended if Newfoundland had sought to join the UK and being admitted with a few represenatives in Westminster as with a few small French Island obtained with France?
 
ASB. The choices in the '48 referenda were joining Confederation (not the Union ;)), an independent Newfoundland or continuing the Commission. Attlee's Britain was offloading all its colonies- why dump India, the Empire's raison d'etre, to acquire a bunch of rocks on the Canadian Atlantic coast? Mackenzie King was lukewarm to the idea in the last few months of his premiership, but eventually accepted their joining Confederation, which took place under his successor Louis St-Laurent in 1949.
 
The Americans would have had a fit - and serve them right!

Roosevelt had a personal agenda of destroying the British, French and Dutch Empires. I seem to remember seeing a disgusting State Department map of FDR's vision for a postwar world. It seems to have been the pattern for much subsequent lunacy by successor Presidents. That, friends, is why Britain lost India - if WWII had not intervened, Gandhi and Nehru might just have had to come to some accommodation with Britain.

Newfoundland and Malta becoming the British equivalent of French Departements isn't such a bad idea - anybody who recalls my Upside Downside Version Two will recall Gibraltar shares MEPs with South West England! Hard (lunatic) fact, folks.

Labrador and Newfoundland would have been OK as adjuncts to the UK, Malta even more so. Cyprus (given 40% occupation by Turkey) would certainly have been better off.

There, that's upset a few applecarts, hasn't it? I must venture out of ASB more often...
 
Roosevelt had a personal agenda of destroying the British, French and Dutch Empires. I seem to remember seeing a disgusting State Department map of FDR's vision for a postwar world. It seems to have been the pattern for much subsequent lunacy by successor Presidents. That, friends, is why Britain lost India - if WWII had not intervened, Gandhi and Nehru might just have had to come to some accommodation with Britain.

Newfoundland and Malta becoming the British equivalent of French Departements isn't such a bad idea - anybody who recalls my Upside Downside Version Two will recall Gibraltar shares MEPs with South West England! Hard (lunatic) fact, folks.

Labrador and Newfoundland would have been OK as adjuncts to the UK, Malta even more so. Cyprus (given 40% occupation by Turkey) would certainly have been better off.

There, that's upset a few applecarts, hasn't it? I must venture out of ASB more often...

Malta is ASB. The Maltese people didnt want it, the Nationalist Party went so far as to boycott the vote, I think only about half the electorate actually voted. Economically and strategically it made no sense. So no way for Malta, and I doubt it for Newfoundland as well.
 
Attlee's Britain was offloading all its colonies- why dump India, the Empire's raison d'etre, to acquire a bunch of rocks on the Canadian Atlantic coast?
Not true.

India was a fait acompli before Attlee took office, despite the Churchillian posturing. Labour was big on colonial development in Africa, see the '45 manifesto...
1945 Labour Manifesto said:
And in all this worth-while work - whether political, military or economic - the Labour Party will seek to promote mutual understanding and cordial co-operation between the Dominions of the British Commonwealth, the advancement of India to responsible self-government, and the planned progress of our Colonial Dependencies.
Hardly a clarion call for ending the Empire.

The honour of ending the colonial Empire goes to Macmillan, who saw the game was up. Had Labour been in power at the time, I can see it going two ways, either a French style colonial disaster in the pull out or a slower pull out. Harold Wilson was fond of saying he was "A Commonwealth man", I think this represents Labour feeling at the time.
 
Roosevelt had a personal agenda of destroying the British, French and Dutch Empires. I seem to remember seeing a disgusting State Department map of FDR's vision for a postwar world. It seems to have been the pattern for much subsequent lunacy by successor Presidents. That, friends, is why Britain lost India - if WWII had not intervened, Gandhi and Nehru might just have had to come to some accommodation with Britain.

That's because the empire's were ancient, outmoded, oppressive, and exploitative (not that I'm saying US policy hasn't been, but that the European colonial empires were). The deserved and needed to be ended; we just applied a short sharp shock to the European powers to ensure they were (well, that and the financial costs of fighting a war).

@Fletcher: So decolonization was like going to China, in that only the party traditionally opposed to it could actually do it?
 
@Fletcher: So decolonization was like going to China, in that only the party traditionally opposed to it could actually do it?
I wouldn't put it in quite those terms, but the Tories, the Party of Empire after all were the ones who grasped the nettle. To portray Labour as hell-bent on getting rid of the colonies is totally false. Economic concerns were the only reason for the post-war pull back. Had Labour won a majority in '51(they won the most votes), I suspect more colonial developmen would have been in order. How Attlee, or his successor would have dealt with African nationalism is open for debate.
 
Prior to incorporation with the Canadian Union Attlee appointed Sir Gordon Macdonald as the last Governor General with the brief of persuading Newfoundlanders to vote to join Canada and getting a debt ridden colony under administration since 1934 off Britain's hands. Macdonald had begun his career as a miner and had become a Labour M.P and had been a regional administrator for fuel and power in the Second World War. After Newfoundland joined the union he returned to Britain and was elevated to a peerage and appointed Paymaster general.

However the Newfoundlanders had asked for administration in 1934 and might have considered the option of seeking to join the United Kingdom had it been available. Malta had at a subsequent date considered joining the UK when Dom Mintoff had his first period at Prime Minister but it was rejexted. At an time when the post war government was about to start decolonising it may have been an embarassment but could Newfoundland have paved the way for a few other small colonies although on the verge of bankrupcy its territory also included much of Labrador with potential mineral wealth. What would have happended if Newfoundland had sought to join the UK and being admitted with a few represenatives in Westminster as with a few small French Island obtained with France?

By a "few small French island(s)" I assume you mean St. Pierre and Miquelon. The latter is still a part of France today, if you want direct annexation it's going to take an alternate storming of the islands. And the people most likely to annex it were actually Canada: King seriously considered doing so IOTL (it's going to be a very touchy subject with Dugalle I imagine, regardless of how small and reasonably insignificant they are).

If Newfoundland stays with the British it's going to be a pretty hefty drag on their economy. Newfoundland had hugeee debt, and it would only be about 40-odd years until the fishing industry collapses (which IOTL absolutely destroyed their economy).

In the long run, I imagine they'll be much more support for Newfoundland independence and a pretty good chance despite economic realities they'd try to strike out on their own (could have interesting effects on Scotland/Wales in the future). There's also a fair chance Canada will go off and rig their election again to join them.
 
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