Thatcher dosnt quit

kenmac

Banned
After defeating Michael Heseltines leadership challenge Thatcher decides to run for another term in office.

First of all could she win the election?
Second what would a 4th term for Thatcher be like?

The last opinion poll taken by Mori with Thatcher in charge was as follows.

Con - 38%
Lab - 46
Lib - 12
Oth - 4
 
After defeating Michael Heseltines leadership challenge Thatcher decides to run for another term in office.

First of all could she win the election?
Second what would a 4th term for Thatcher be like?

The last opinion poll taken by Mori with Thatcher in charge was as follows.

Con - 38%
Lab - 46
Lib - 12
Oth - 4

Thatcher will lose the leadership bid, to Hesseltine and then he'll lose the next election as he didn't have the support of the Tories but they saw him as a useful way of getting rid of Thatcher and the electorate was sick of the Tories
 
After defeating Michael Heseltines leadership challenge Thatcher decides to run for another term in office.

First of all could she win the election?
Second what would a 4th term for Thatcher be like?

The last opinion poll taken by Mori with Thatcher in charge was as follows.

Con - 38%
Lab - 46
Lib - 12
Oth - 4

It's just about possible she could win in 1991/2, given that she was largely behind between 1975 and 1979, 1979 and 1983, and 1983 and 1987 anyway, but I suspect that by the early 1990s it's too late- she'd become just too detached from reality, and with the Soviet threat gone, and the trade union movement utterly eviscerated by her, there's no real need for Britain to put up with her strong style of leadership. Of course, events can intervene, as they will in a TL RogueBeaver and I are writing. But in general, unless Thatcher is very lucky, she won't win in 1992.

If she does, there'll be some differences to the Major government, but not many. A fourth Thatcher term will leave the railways well alone for example, and avoid a botched privatisation attempt. In addition to this, she'll be FAR more Eurosceptic than Major ever was. The party itself though, ironically considering the divise nature of its leader, will be a more coherent force without the trauma of her demise.

I suspect she'll retire in 1994 after being PM for fifteen years. She'll be approaching her seventieth birthday, and will be absolutely exhausted. Who succeeds her is anyone's guess.
 
Another possibility is a minority government of either party. Such instability would mean an election by 1995 at the latest. If Lab wanted to play hardball, they could call for a motion of non-confidence in the middle of a leadership race. That happened in Canada in 1968 when the Liberals lost a confidence motion when many of their MPs were away on vacation, and the Liberal leadership race was in full swing. Bob Stanfield "didn't press", and thus the Governor-General did not force a dissolution. I don't think Neil Kinnock would either.
 
Another possibility is a minority government of either party. Such instability would mean an election by 1995 at the latest. If Lab wanted to play hardball, they could call for a motion of non-confidence in the middle of a leadership race. That happened in Canada in 1968 when the Liberals lost a confidence motion when many of their MPs were away on vacation, and the Liberal leadership race was in full swing. Bob Stanfield "didn't press", and thus the Governor-General did not force a dissolution. I don't think Neil Kinnock would either.

RB, no, this is not a possibility. Britain does not have minority governments, and never has had one. The country, unlike Canada, is totally unused to this sort of thing.
 
RB, no, this is not a possibility. Britain does not have minority governments, and never has had one. The country, unlike Canada, is totally unused to this sort of thing.

Is that a very clever joke I'm missing?

Thacther defeated in a 1992 election might do the Tories a world of good. No 'coup' just popular defeat, the factions might go less bat shit.
 
Originally posted by Basileus Giorgios
Britain does not have minority governments, and never has had one.

Minority governments in Britain since 1892:

Liberal with Irish Nationalist support 1892-1895.
Liberal with Irish Nationalist and Labour support January to December 1910, and December 1910 to May 1915.
Labour with Liberal support January 1924 to October 1924; June 1929 to Auguat 1931; February 1974 to October 1974, and March 1977 to July 1978.
Labour without support from another party or parties July 1978 to May 1979.
 

kenmac

Banned
Thatcher will lose the leadership bid, to Hesseltine and then he'll lose the next election as he didn't have the support of the Tories but they saw him as a useful way of getting rid of Thatcher and the electorate was sick of the Tories

Thatcher had already beat Heseltine 204 votes to 152.
 
She did not have the 15% of the total (voting and non-voting) caucus margin required rather than a simple majority as is usually done in modern leadership races. When 40% of the MPs want someone else, there is a serious problem. They didn't think they could win with her, largely because of the poll tax, recession and Europe. Two of those things were of her own making. I still believe she could've won a minority government, or a small majority that would be whittled down to a minority by the next dissolution, as happened in 1992 IOTL. She'd have retired by 1994 and handed over to John Major, who'd have lost in a landslide to Tony Blair, John Smith or Gordon Brown, depending on butterflies.

If you want my opinion on why she didn't get that margin: the same reason as Ted Heath in 1975. Backbenchers saw her as arrogant, abrasive and remote. Neither of them bothered to be solicitous, and became so preoccupied with the frontbench they forgot that that the Cabinet comprised less than 20% of the caucus.
 
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kenmac

Banned
She did not have the 15% of the total (voting and non-voting) caucus margin required rather than a simple majority as is usually done in modern leadership races. When 40% of the MPs want someone else, there is a serious problem. They didn't think they could win with her, largely because of the poll tax, recession and Europe. Two of those things were of her own making. I still believe she could've won a minority government, or a small majority that would be whittled down to a minority by the next dissolution, as happened in 1992 IOTL. She'd have retired by 1994 and handed over to John Major, who'd have lost in a landslide to Tony Blair, John Smith or Gordon Brown, depending on butterflies.

I have no doubt she would have won in the next round a lot of MP's only voted against her in the first to give her a scare.
Not only that but I think she may well have gone to the voters in 91 rather than 92.
I remember a lot of anti-European talk and even a rising of anti-immigrant language that was happening around that time so it is very likely she would have won again.
We may have missed the ERM debacle if she had stayed on too.

People need to remember how populist the Conservative party was back then.
An example -

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=APNA...7595704E&playnext=1&playnext_from=PL&index=33
 
Re immigration: When Heath was consulting the Shadow Cabinet about sacking Enoch Powell after Rivers of Blood, Thatcher basically said "tone no, content yes." Heath's reaction is not recorded.
 

kenmac

Banned
Re immigration: When Heath was consulting the Shadow Cabinet about sacking Enoch Powell after Rivers of Blood, Thatcher basically said "tone no, content yes." Heath's reaction is not recorded.

Files released to the National Archives show that soon after becoming prime minister, Lady Thatcher privately complained that too many Asian immigrants were being allowed into Britain.
The documents, which are published today under the “30 year rule”, shed further light on Lady Thatcher’s attitudes on race and immigration, political issues that have remained controversial ever since.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/new...ained-about-Asian-immigration-to-Britain.html

A friend of mine and a friend of Lady Thatcher has told me today she has gone quite a bit further than this in her opinions on the subject.
 
You can promote an economic-based rather than a family-based immigration system: that's what PM Harper has done here in trying to overhaul our obsolete and inefficient system. He's won Tory votes from immigrant communities for doing so. :cool: She can sell it as politically savvy, because importing middle-class or wealthy immigrants would give the Tories a foothold in the immigrant communities, as the Tories over here have. ;)
 
Guys

The big problem for Thatcher was probably how out of touch she was. Remember she was still arguing for the Poll Tax and saying that it needed to be sold harder as people weren't getting the message? [When it was clear to just about everybody including many Tories, that the problem was the population had got the message and hated it]. Also most of the big sell-offs had occurred and there was a big financial bubble growing so there were a lot of problems. I think if she had hung in and remained as the Tory leader they would have been dragged down with her.

Steve
 
Going back to the original question...

If Thatcher had remained in power at that point when the French Foreign Legion was in reach of Baghdad, she might have agreed with the French President to go in and finish the job.

Result : No massacre of Marsh Arabs and the presence of a credible Iraqi opposition to take over when Saddam was toppled.

Also possible that a squadron of RAF planes could have flown from Germany to the Balkans and stopped the Serb tanks from rolling west of Belgrade. The idea that Western Europe would act rather than stand around wringing its hands would have been a nasty shock to the thugs.

Result : A much shorter Balkan war and fewer deaths all round.

Not maybe what some people want to hear, but possible given her statements at the time. An Iraq with minimum occupation and a homegrown democracy would be a better one, surely, and a more peaceful Balkans would be safer for its population.

"Why didn't you go in and kill Saddam Hussein?"
"Because you told us not to."
"Oh, that was just politics."
 
I have no doubt she would have won in the next round a lot of MP's only voted against her in the first to give her a scare.

Considering her supporters, her cabinet colleagues (sic) and, eventually, the woman herself believed that she would be defeated on the next ballot, (she would never, ever, have resigned unless it looked certain) this seems like a rather bizzare assertion.

The reality is this: that by 1987 even people like Tebbit were wondering just how much of a liability she was; as such, she was very much on borrowed time. Even if she had squeaked in past Heseltine on the first ballot, (Easily possible with minor tinkering) and beaten Labour in the election on a knife-edge (Much less likely, but perchance just about concievable) then the next few years would have been a disaster, painted in the lurid colours of a non-existant commons majority, perpetually declining authority and a party which would have been, in effect, out of control. Think the Major years, but on speed. It would not have been pleasant to watch, and it would have done absolutely nothing for her reputation.

If it hadn't been done in 1990, then either the electorate or the party would have done it at a later date. My preference is that the electorate should have done it in '91. But it was going to happen one way or the other.
 
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