Thatcher Lives On

How does this look as a possible senario;

November 1990 - Thatcher clings on in the first round of the Conservative leadership election by 1 vote. Her authority is damaged,but she vows to fight and win a fourth general election.

January 1991 - Thatcher orders British troops into war in the Gulf. The tory supporting press back her, but Labour remain ahead in the opinion polls.

March 1991 - John Major gives his second budget. He suggests to the Prime Minister the idea of a 2.5% rise in VAT to pay for tempoary reductions in the Community Charge for the duration of the economic dowturn. After a bitter cabinet battle Major gives in to Thatchers oposition to this and instead reduces income tax to 24% payed for by an increase in already high government borrowing. This is seen by the press as a desperate attempt to improve the Conservatives standing in the polls.

May 1991 - The Conservatives get just 23% of the vote in district council election in England and Wales. The Conservatives lose councils such as Lichfield and Traford to Labour and Tunbridge Wells to the Liberal Democrats. This is a major embarisment for the Conservatives and questions start to be asked yet again about Thatchers ability to lead her party.

Thatcher re-shuffles her cabinet and promotes right winger John Redwood to the cabinet as Chief Secretery to the Tresuary. Norman Lamont turns down a life peerage and the job of leader of the House of Lords and resigns to the backbenches in protest.

Just days later, Michael Heseltine challeges Mrs Thatcher for the part leadership for a second time. He wins the support of most of the left of the party and close cabinet collegues such as John Major and Douglas Hurd convince her that her time is up and it would be better for her to leave now.

She agrees and anounces her departure the following day in a press conference in the Downing Street garden. There will be an unusually long six week campaign period leading upto the vote which Thatcher says will give the party time to decide the direction it wants to take in the run up to the election.

However, the tories are still 15% behind Labour in the polls.

June 1991 - Michael Heseltine, John Major and John Redwood fight the leadership election. Redwood withdraws after a week because of limited support and declairs his support for Major. In the end, Heseltine gets 40% of the vote (mainly from the centre and left of the paty), but Major is seen as the candidate who can best unite the party and continue some of Mrs Thatchers more popular policies. Hesletine decides not to force a second balot and John Major becomes Prime Minister in mid June 1991.
 
Well the short answer is that Neil Kinnock becomes PM, while Major will get a boost the fact that the Community Charge has now been implemented and the much shorter amount of time he has to differentiate himself dooms the Tories.
That said in the medium term this is good news for the Tory Party. No Black Wednesday destroying the Tory Parties reputation for economic competence, no Blair landslide, Less fuss over the Maastricht rebels, Neil Kinnock as PM. By 2000-2 you'll probably see a refreshed and revamped Tory party sweep to power.
 
Well the short answer is that Neil Kinnock becomes PM, while Major will get a boost the fact that the Community Charge has now been implemented and the much shorter amount of time he has to differentiate himself dooms the Tories.
That said in the medium term this is good news for the Tory Party. No Black Wednesday destroying the Tory Parties reputation for economic competence, no Blair landslide, Less fuss over the Maastricht rebels, Neil Kinnock as PM. By 2000-2 you'll probably see a refreshed and revamped Tory party sweep to power.

That what I had in mind. Major won't have time to carry out a full review of local government finance and pass legislation before the 1992 elections.

Local government finance becomes the key issue of the 1992 general election. Everyone (except for a few on the tory right) agrees that the Community Charge has to go, but the big question is what will replace it. The tories put forward countil tax as their alternative and Labout put forward a local income tax.

The polls will probably narrow leading towards polling day and there will still be a tax cutting pre-election budget.

My guess is that Labour would probably have won a majority of a about 15 seats. A lot less than what they could have got if Thatcher had still been in power, but their willingness to reform local government saves the tories from a landslide defeat.
 
Well the short answer is that Neil Kinnock becomes PM, while Major will get a boost the fact that the Community Charge has now been implemented and the much shorter amount of time he has to differentiate himself dooms the Tories.
That said in the medium term this is good news for the Tory Party. No Black Wednesday destroying the Tory Parties reputation for economic competence, no Blair landslide, Less fuss over the Maastricht rebels, Neil Kinnock as PM. By 2000-2 you'll probably see a refreshed and revamped Tory party sweep to power.

Why no Black Wednesday, after all the causes of that were economic down to the pound being overvalued within the ERM and the speculation against it by financiers such as George Soros. My memory is that going into the 1992 election the labour party were as committed to the ERM as the Tories. Given labour's record for economic incompetence I think it is unlikely they would have withdrawn from the system, so they rather than Lamont and co would have borne the brunt of the economic storm of 1992 which would have then gone on to only confirm in people's minds the image of labour incompetence with the economy which I think would have truncated the labour government, already struggling with a slim majority.

If the lab govt was really short lived what would that have done to the labour party already out of power for nearly a generation? All in all 1992 was a good election to loose.
 
British Political TLs

It's an interesting idea but unfortunately I can't quite see it.

Had Thatcher survived in November 1990 she would have been severely damaged of course but so would Heseltine whose "big chance" had come and gone. Those MPs who had voted for Heseltine would face the wrath of constituency associations and there would be virtual civil war within the Conservative Party.

The Gulf War would have occurred in OTL but while Thatcher might have gone to Kuwait and played the role of the "warrior queen" as well as in the Falklands, the end of the USSR and other world events were moving on past her.

23% seems an incredibly low figure for the local elections and would have meant at least 2,500 seats lost (in 1995 the same seats saw the Conservatives lose 2000 seats on a 25% vote share). Labour would have picked up the vast majority with the Lib Dems gaining 500 at bst which is a huge boost to Paddy Ashdown.

The problem with the scenario is that there HAD to be a general election by June 1992. For the Conservatives to embark on a second bloody leadership contest barely a year before an election would have been suicidal and I simply don't see Heseltine trying again eight months after he had narrowly failed.

I think it more likely he would have kept his counsel, watched the party suffer a massive defeat and offer himself as a leader to the survivors.
 
I'll continue where I left off.

Labour win the election with a small majority of 15 seats. That comes as no suprise to the country. John Smith becomes chancellor and most cabinet roles go to the people who shaddowed them in oposition. Betty Boothroyd becomes speaker of the House of Commons.

Labours first Queens speach consists of bills replacing council tax with a local income tax, abolishing the NHS internal market, abolishing grant maintaind schools and a bill ratifying the Maastricht treaty, but without the opt-outs from the social chapter and the single currency.

John Major resigns as leader of the Conservative party and is replaced by Douglas Hurd after a fairly uneventful leadership election in which Ken Cleark was the only other candidate.
 
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