Orville_third
Banned
If the inspectors leave in 1994 and the bombings begin, one wonders what Hussein Kamil would do- would he defect per OTL? Would he order the WMD destroyed as OTL?
TLIAW: The Curse of Maggie
- Thread starter Thande
- Start date
Thande
Donor
JOHN SMITH
(Labour)
1994-1996
An Honest Man Needs No Alias
The incumbent Chancellor at the time of the attack on Downing Street, John Smith had one particular advantage in the ensuing leadership contest. Eleven years before, he had acted as Roy Hattersley’s campaign manager for his own leadership attempt, and the two remained good friends and keen allies. Hattersley did everything in his power to pave the way for Smith’s succession, and with many key figures in the party in disarray even four months after the attack, there was little opposition to Smith’s ascension—barring a largely symbolic challenge from Tony Benn in his final bid for the Labour leadership. In Smith’s first speech as Labour leader and Prime Minister he paid tribute to Kinnock and pledged that his government would follow in his footsteps and cleave to Kinnock’s legacy. This was both a well-judged PR move in terms of public sympathy for Kinnock and also fitted with Smith’s own views for the most part. There remained some grumbles within the Labour Party about Smith’s small-c conservative approach to further reforms and policies rather than merely continuing Kinnock’s programme, some of which was ultimately a mask for those that were disappointed for prejudiced reasons that the Labour Party had replaced a Welshman with a Scotsman. Such attitudes were (in)famously parodied in a photo caption in Private Eye, which was criticised for its bad taste and ended with an out-of-court settlement:
Smith oversaw the first tranche of elections to the newly created legislative bodies of the Scottish Parliament, the Welsh Assembly and the London Assembly. The ‘Celtic cabal’ leadership the Eye had parodied coupled to a wave of public sympathy to deliver landslide Labour majorities in the first two bodies, while the London Assembly was more divided. Labour did, however, capture the elected mayoralty with former GLC head Ken Livingstone, who began his first speech as Mayor with “As I was saying before I was so rudely interrupted...” The Liberals polled well in rural northern Scotland where Labour’s vote was less significant, helped by the SNP suffering from a backlash after Alex Salmond publicly walked out of a meeting of the Scottish Constitutional Forum over their refusal to even discuss the possibility of Scottish independence. Salmond had intended this to be a principled gesture but it was generally regarded as immature by many swing voters, and the Liberals were the chief benefactor. They also doubtless benefited from now being headed by a Scot themselves, Sir Menzies Campbell. The Tories underperformed compared to their last Westminster score, hurt by their opposition to devolution throughout the process, and fell to third place for the first time in a Scotland-wide election since the general election of October 1974. The Conservative Party collectively decided that something must be done, and Shadow Scottish Secretary Malcolm Rifkind was appointed head of an internal party commission aimed at restoring Scottish voters’ trust in the party.
The Tories’ poor performance in the 1994 devolved and local elections were only the final nail in Michael Portillo’s coffin: the Tory leader had already been suffering from persistent innuendoes about his past proclivities and was now humiliated by Smith’s legendary wit at Prime Minister’s Questions. He resigned before he was pushed but, to the disappointment of the Heseltinian/Clarkeite wets who had wielded the knife, he would be replaced by another from the Thatcherite wing of the party, albeit a more moderate one.
It would be another Thatcherite who would be an embarrassment for Smith, however. In an attempt (suggested by Peter Mandelson) to build Labour’s connection to the youth, he created the office of Media Secretary and sent its inaugural holder, Chris Smith, to the 1995 BRIT Awards. The latter Smith (Private Eye also had fun with their common surname) had a drink thrown over him by Geri Haliwell, then lead singer of the popular girl group Touch, who then issued a rant broadcast live on national television about the alleged sexism in Parliament and contrasted it to Mrs Thatcher holding the highest office in the land. Controversy over this led to Halliwell leaving Touch (being replaced with Michelle Stephenson) and becoming a solo artist, as well as Chris Smith eventually being reshuffled to MAFF.
Smith’s tenure saw a number of significant events in the history of the world—and beyond. Apartheid ended in South Africa and Nelson Mandela was elected President, a comet collided with Jupiter, and the Information Superhighway was never far out of the news. Though the World Wide Web had primarily been invented by a Briton, the UK lagged behind the USA in terms of adoption until Smith was convinced by Home Secretary Tony Blair of its potential benefits and impact. As BT had remained a private company under this Labour government, a new organisation was instead spun off the Royal Mail, UKWEB2000, with the intention of raising awareness of the potential of the World Wide Web for government, business and individuals and making the technology and facilities more readily available. Though it did have a significant impact, it does not justify the appearance of claims in the 1997 Labour manifesto that the government had ‘invented the internet’.
Though the world might see more political upheavals than Britain itself—the election of President Balladur in France and the ensuing public sector strikes, the budget confrontation between President Cuomo and the Republicans in the United States, continuing unrest in the Balkans—Smith nonetheless had to oversee contentious issues such as the implementation of the Maastricht Treaty, the divorce of Prince Charles and Princess Diana, and the public outcry after the shocking Dunblane Massacre, which made it clear that it was not only politicians who had to fear such violent attacks. The tabloids ran ‘Lawless Britain’ headlines for weeks and the whole affair fed into a general sense of malaise, one summarised by the reappearance of James Bond (as portrayed by Liam Neeson) in GoldenEye, in which he is described by Tim McInnery’s youthful new M as out-of-touch and a relic of the Cold War. As the Nineties wore on, it was as though a sense of purposelessness extended to Britain itself: what was the country’s real driving force anymore? What was needed was a leader who could hearken back to the glory days while promising new vistas ahead.
Smith might have succeeded in restoring such public confidence had he been able to continue as Prime Minister, but such was not to be. Having already suffered one heart attack in 1988, he was aware of the risks and Number Ten had medical staff and equipment in place after the lessons learned with the tragic death of Michael Heseltine. Thus when a second attack came in 1996, Smith was saved and eventually made a full recovery, surviving another decade afterwards. However, his doctors gave him the ultimatum that his heart could not take the strain of his role as Prime Minister any longer. Smith gave a tearful resignation speech to the massed cameras before Number Ten, though even then he could not resist the urge to add a wisecrack, punning on the phrase ‘It is with a heavy heart that I...’
Though Smith had wanted to at least stay on until a new leadership election could be held, his medical opinion was adamant and thus it was for the second time during the Labour government that the succession procedures were activated...
I don't get what Private Eye had done to have to settle a court case. Bad taste is what they have been renowned for ever since they showed the head of Distillers - who were resisting calls to compensate victims of the thalidomide they had sold - thus:
http://antiques.gift/private-eye-no-285-friday-17-november-1972_7559630.html
http://antiques.gift/private-eye-no-285-friday-17-november-1972_7559630.html
Alex Richards
Donor
A nice twist on the heart attacks there- not a death but a health scare sufficient to force a resignation. Also loving the growing cultural divergences (I assume the Spice Girls considered that name at some point).
I really have no idea who's going to be the interim leader here. Tony Benn in a last 'elder statesman' role? Tony Blair going on to win the leadership campaign? We've already lost John Prescott and Bryan Gould, and while I assume Margaret Beckett will at least be running for the leadership, Geri's comment there wouldn't make that much sense if she was Deputy PM.
I really have no idea who's going to be the interim leader here. Tony Benn in a last 'elder statesman' role? Tony Blair going on to win the leadership campaign? We've already lost John Prescott and Bryan Gould, and while I assume Margaret Beckett will at least be running for the leadership, Geri's comment there wouldn't make that much sense if she was Deputy PM.
I wouldn't be me if I didn't through this note in - I know TLIAD(W) have a handwavium with regards to realism, but Biden wouldn't give up his seat for SoT - he could still be their as chair of Foreign Relations committee perhaps. You don't need to change it, but I had to say it. 
Thande
Donor
I wouldn't be me if I didn't through this note in - I know TLIAD(W) have a handwavium with regards to realism, but Biden wouldn't give up his seat for SoT - he could still be their as chair of Foreign Relations committee perhaps. You don't need to change it, but I had to say it.
I was going to make him Vice-President initially, but then I thought that seemed too much, but maybe I corrected too far down the other way. IIRC transport seemed like a subject Biden is sufficiently interested in that it seemed a plausible cabinet position for him.
However, as you imply, all the US and European stuff is really just there to remind everyone of the trademark Thande "butterflies are a thing, maybe sometimes too much of a thing, and stuff in the world outside isn't quite the same" aspect of the setting. I think as long as I don't allude to a Ron Paul vs Dennis Kuchinich presidential contest I should be okay
That's a nice touch. It's quite sensible that with Heseltine dying in office, precautions would be taken against it happening again.
With these curve balls, I'm starting to suspect that if Major becomes P.M. it won't be a scandal that causes him to leave office.
Cheers,
Nigel.
Thande
Donor
MARGARET BECKETT
(Labour)
1996-1996
talk.politics.not-all-margarets
“Turns out wimmin can ’ave power in this country but only if they’re called Margaret! Eh? Eh? I bet that Emily Pankhurst felt silly when they scraped ’er off of the ’orse’s ’ooves, eh, all she ’ad to do woz change ’er name by deed poll!” Ben Elton’s stand-up monologue was crude (and confused Emmeline Pankhurst with Emily Davison) but did capture the much-noted oddity that Britain’s first and second female Prime Ministers shared a Christian name. Aside from that of course they shared little. Margaret Beckett had always been on the Left of the party, having backed Tony Benn in the past and supported Smith strongly. In the aftermath of the Haliwell incident and the accusations of a sexist culture in the Cabinet, Beckett had been reshuffled to the Foreign Office and almost incidentally had also taken on the role of Deputy Prime Minister and designated successor. None but the most paranoid (and familiar with John Smith’s medical record) had feared that a second succession would be required within one Parliament. Unlike Roy Hattersley, Beckett had no intention of merely serving as a caretaker. She announced that a leadership election would take place in three months and she would stand. Her campaign manager was Chief Secretary to the Treasury (and future Mayor of London) Harriet Harman and she also received support from Minister for Women Clare Short, both being determined to respond to the Haliwell scandal with a full-bore feminist campaign both out of principle and to win back support from female voters—who, whether because of Labour’s alleged macho image or for other reasons, had historically tended to default to a Conservative leaning. Indeed, of all general elections since the war, Labour would have won every one if only men had voted, while the Tories would have won them all if only women could vote. Beckett was determined to change that.
The Right of the Labour Party would not let the vote go unchallenged, though. The polls were volatile but the next general election still looked winnable for Labour if they could close the gap. The Right was collectively convinced that Beckett as leader would alienate too many jittery swing voters with business interests. Under other circumstances they might have struggled to find a standard bearer, but not in 1996. The Home Secretary, Tony Blair, united the Right behind him and made it a two-horse race. Not even the usual perennial candidates dared enter in the knowledge that their vote would be squeezed to a humiliating sliver. Blair’s great vision was ‘modernising’ the Labour Party, and while different members might disagree on just what ‘modernism’ was, he was acutely aware of the potential PR dangers of being the opponent to an openly feminist campaign. Blair was keen to avoid being seen as the ‘macho’ or misogynist candidate, and was helped in this by his campaign manager, Education Secretary Mo Mowlam: “We are about to enter the twenty-first century. At this point we should feel mature enough that a contest between a woman and man is on equal grounds, and we should choose between them based on their policy views and leadership capabilities. Tony and I agree that Margaret is a fine, capable minister, but we do not believe her proposed policies are those which will prevent the Tories from ruining the legacy of Neil and John.” Blair and his allies’ use of Christian names was fairly novel at the time and showed their more informal and media-engaging approach to politics—which was dismissed by their opponents as superficial showboating.
Beckett’s time in office before the leadership contest was brief, but did see a number of incidents including the foiling of a major Provisional IRA bombing attempt on Birmingham—the arrest of several senior operational commanders would break the back of the mainland bombing campaign—the start of the England-hosted UEFA ’96 in which England would make the final only to lose to Germany, and the announcement that scientists in Scotland had produced the first clone animal, Samantha the sheep. However, soon—too soon, according to some—the votes for the leadership contest were in. The result was very close, and it has been argued that it was Mowlam who made the difference. Beckett actually narrowly won the Parliamentary Labour Party vote, helping at least partially silence the accusations that there was a sexist culture in the party, but Blair defeated her in the constituency vote and, to the surprise of many, the affiliated trade union vote. This has been attributed to the fact that enough of the trade unions accepted Mowlam’s argument that Beckett would not be able to stop the Tories from winning the next election while Blair could, and that they cared more about keeping the Tories out of power than what any Labour alternative’s policy was. Thus in a knife-edge and rather bitter contest, the brief tenure of Britain’s second female Prime Minister came to a close. Beckett chose to retire from Parliament at the 1997 election and is now a UN Global Ambassador for Women’s Rights.
Thande
Donor
TONY BLAIR
(Labour)
1996-1997
Three Priorities: Re-election, Re-election, Re-election
Tony Blair’s premiership has been described as one of missed opportunities. In some ways he could have been one of the most radical Prime Ministers the country had ever had, with ideas that shocked and intrigued people from across the political landscape. However, whatever his unquestioned rhetorical skills, he had the misfortune to acquire Number Ten at a time when a slow economy and a poisonous climate within his party—a legacy of his contentious leadership election—made re-election an uphill battle. There will also always be a minority that hate him for having unseated Beckett, an odium that has forever by extension dogged his wife Cherie’s attempts to be accepted by the British feminist movement. Blair’s enthusiasm for the EU and in particular for the UK joining the ECU (now rebranded as the Euro) would also cause divisions: Kinnock had been keen on the organisation but had carefully and quietly organised an opt-out for the single currency in order to avoid splitting his party. Blair’s problem was arguably, as Peter Mandelson later claimed in an interview, that “he governed as though he possessed a huge majority, a party that was one hundred percent behind him, five years of parliament ahead of him, and a divided and unelectable opposition. Goodness knows what he could’ve achieved if he’d had those things.”
As has been pointed out by Labour Right apologists ever since, much of the credit for things Blair did in office has instead gone to his successors, in particular his decision to place the Bank of England in control of interest rates and his creation of the Jenkins Commission for Constitutional Reform. Pop culture ignores such achievements in favour of the enduring image of an ill-judged media opportunity where the guitarist Blair collaborated with East 17 on a cover of ‘Stay Another Day’ with adjusted lyrics, intended to serve as Labour’s campaign song. Satirists roundly mocked this and Spitting Image depicted the Tories retaliating by collaborating with Baddiel and Skinner with ‘Voters Coming Home’, a parody of their hopeful ‘Three Lions’ from UEFA ’96. Blair was also criticised for overly negative scare campaigning aimed at the Conservatives, which may have lost him votes to the more positive campaign of the Liberals.
Blair nonetheless was PM for a number of important world events, including the re-election of President Cuomo, the opening of the Channel Tunnel (which had been repeatedly delayed by industrial disputes in France) and British academics winning the Nobel Prizes in both Economics and Chemistry (jointly with foreign colleagues). Sport was much more of a mixed bag, with the heartbreak of England’s defeat in the UEFA ’96 final as well as a disastrous performance for Team GB at the Toronto Summer Olympics, which would lead to a shakeup of funding and programmes for British Olympic athletes. Comet Hale-Bopp was the brightest and most impressive comet for many years, and the usual rent-a-crackpot brigade wondered what omen it might foreshadow for the general election. In the end, though Blair was able to considerably narrow the polls from how they had stood in 1996, he would go down to defeat...
Thande - this continues to delight in every way - bravo!
I don't see Blair losing in 1997 though, I mean, the only person who could possibly beat him would have to be a down-to-earth, aspirational working-class urban Tory, ideally with some past experience as a "safe pair of hands" at the Treasu...
...ah.
Also - "Alliance 2000: The Liberals."
I don't see Blair losing in 1997 though, I mean, the only person who could possibly beat him would have to be a down-to-earth, aspirational working-class urban Tory, ideally with some past experience as a "safe pair of hands" at the Treasu...
...ah.
Also - "Alliance 2000: The Liberals."
Thande
Donor
JOHN MAJOR
(Conservative)
1997-2000
This Grey Spirit
John Major had played several significant Cabinet roles in the last Tory government, being promoted to Chancellor by Thatcher shortly before the end of her premiership and then holding fast to Heseltine. He was regarded as a moderate, with sympathy towards Heseltinian-Clarkeite pro-Europeanism but also a defender of Mrs Thatcher’s political legacy if not always her character. Though he had sought the leadership once before, Major had always seemed most comfortable in the background, an éminence grise working for the benefit of Heseltine, Clarke and then Portillo while quietly exerting his own influence. In fact Le Monde profiled Portillo at one point and used the phrase, which was then accidentally literally over-translated as ‘grey eminence’ by the Guardian in covering the piece. The label seemed appropriate given Major’s obscure, whitebread image and his grey suits, and stuck (much to his private annoyance), helped along by Spitting Image parodies.
Major was catapulted into the limelight at long last when, after several disappointing local election performances (and the inaugural devolved assembly elections) together with persistent accusations concerning his private life, Michael Portillo resigned the Tory leadership. Though Major did not particularly seek the role even then, he regarded his first priority as preserving the unity of the Conservative Party and avoiding the European infighting of the last Tory government. He found this easier under Smith and Beckett than under Blair, whose bold decision to put Euro entry into the 1997 Labour manifesto forced Major to take a side. Major himself privately thought British Euro entry was inevitable, but saw that votes were to be had from rejectionists appalled at the thought of losing Harold Wilson’s ‘pound in their pocket’. As a compromise, he called for British Euro entry to be considered in the future once certain key economic tests were met, but only after a mass public consultation (he rejected ‘the R-word’ he called it due to the dangerous precedent it might set) and for Britain not to join the Euro as soon as possible, and perhaps even by 1999 with most of the EU countries, as Blair advocated.
Major’s chief asset was his background. Though some might dismiss him as ‘the only man ever to run away from the circus to become an accountant’, his credentials as a working-class kid from Brixton who rose to the premiership were a neat contrast against Blair, whose PR-conscious and vaguely-locationless image meant he came across as fake and untrustworthy to some working-class swing voters. Thought Blair was very fluent in his speeches, Major was also somewhat better at being spontaneous, which came across in Prime Minister’s Questions. This factor was the basis in one of the most memorable moments of the 1997 general election, when Major interrupted a speech Blair was giving from a glitzy podium in Trafalgar Square by walking on with a literal soapbox under his arm, standing on it and attempting to engage him in an impromptu debate. Though some considered the stunt crass or below-the-belt, Blair’s comically shocked expression was plastered across every tabloid front page and probably played a role in his defeat. The Labour Party was also criticised for its overuse of negative campaigning, including one infamous poster in particular:
Labour did at least have one consolation prize, as the second London Mayoral election was held on General Election day and Ken Livingstone won a second three-year term, defeating the Tory candidate Jeffrey Archer. One remarkable occurrence was that the Green Party of England and Wales stood Robert Llewelyn of Red Dwarf fame largely as a vanity exercise, and he ended up capturing a surprise 15% of the vote and coming close behind the Liberals. The other parties observed and took away the lesson that the London electorate, at least for this office, seemed particularly enthused for ‘wacky celebrity’ candidates...
The 1997 general election was also noted for its rather low turnout of 68%, leading some to speak of concern with public disillusionment with politics. The Liberals arguably benefited due to their supporters being more reliable to turn out, and Menzies Campbell won 29 seats, the most the party had held in the modern era (but on a rather smaller voteshare than the Alliance had obtained in 1983). A popular joke was that more people had voted in the Eurovision Song Contest held a month later (delayed due to a natural disaster in the host country), in which Britain’s Katrina and the Waves finished fifth and France won for the first time since 1977.
One of the first crises Major was forced to deal with was the tragic death of Princess Diana. Having divorced Prince Charles the previous year, the charity campaigner was secretly filmed committing a sexual act with Dodi Fayed, son of Mohamed Fayed of Harrods fame, and took her own life the day before the pictures were published. The resulting shock was felt not only in the United Kingdom but across the world, for a global audience had been following the fairy story that turned into a Gothic horror. Major managed the government response adeptly, helped by his good relationship with the Queen, and spoke at the funeral, which was watched by over a billion people. “Should this tragedy be nothing more than a flag at half-mast on Buckingham Palace, and then we all shrug and move on? Of course not!” Major said. “If this action had been perpetrated by terrorists, then all right-thinking people would call on us to hunt them down and bring them to justice. I say it was perpetrated by terrorists, no less worthy of that black name because they carry Nikons rather than Kalashnikovs. And common morality behooves us to avenge the death of this troubled young woman who touched the hearts of so many by ensuring that it can never happen again.” Major’s words were more than just rhetoric and he led a crusade against the abuse of press freedom. The fact that powerful forces were aligned against him became clear when a story of Major’s own past adulterous affair with Edwina Currie swept the papers, but Major stood firm against what might have brought down other leaders. He held a press conference in Westminster Hall with the entire Parliamentary Conservative Party arrayed behind him and announced that if any man or woman stepped forward to call for his resignation, he would resign. Not one did. “Let he who is without sin cast the first stone,” Major quoted. The whole ‘Back to Basics’ crusade would conclude with Major perhaps wishing one of his other early acts in office had not been to return Hong Kong to the Chinese, as—after it became clear just how far the rot went up the system and arrest warrants were issued—a luxury penthouse there on loan from the Chinese government became the permanent home to one R. Murdoch, Esq. Ironically enough, a celebrity magazine would later obtain photos of his infamous tennis match with fellow exile from Interpol, Idi Amin.
The whole affair did much for Major’s popularity, helped when Tony Blair chose to resign as Labour leader in 1999 due to continued personal attacks from his backbenchers and a heart scare which, by this point, was becoming somewhat infamously associated with political leadership—a point exemplified by the spoof public information film Is Politics Bad For Your Heart? by Bremner, Bird and Fortune. Major went from strength to strength, presiding over a booming economy and the popular Millennium celebrations, including a large dome inspired by the Dome of Discovery from the Festival of Britain fifty years earlier. Major was the Prime Minister to see in the Millennium and spoke of a new age of prosperity and opportunity, yet one in which the heritage of the past would not be lost. Like his predecessor Tony Blair he showed an enthusiasm for what new technology could do, and by the end of his premiership over a quarter of the population of the United Kingdom had access to the internet.
The devolved elections of 1998 showed a Tory recovery in Scotland if not in Wales, which was perhaps indicative that the result was as much due to an improved position for the SNP spoiling the Tories into victory in places as it was Malcolm Rifkind’s much-vaunted ‘charm offensive’ to mend the damage caused by the Tories’ previous strident opposition to devolution. However, more votes for the SNP did not translate into more seats and Alex Salmond was swiftly replaced by John Swinney, who took the party on a new tack. Labour’s position was better in the local elections, in which both Blair and his successor presided over large gains despite Major’s popularity.
Foreign policy also had several crucial tests under Major, and not all of them involved Europe. The Troubles gradually calmed and much of the groundwork was laid for the peace process that would be completed under Labour. America had a long drawn-out presidential contest, with Senator Al Gore Jr. defeating Vice President Ann Richards and Senator Bill Clinton (who had to drop out part way through the primaries due to health reasons) for the Democratic nomination and facing the son of the murdered George Bush as his opponent. The incredibly close result was subject to many recounts and in the end, despite losing the popular vote, Gore won in the electoral college. He would be treated as illegitimate by the opposition Republicans for the entirety of his term, but Jeb Bush himself retired from politics and joined with Stephen Kinnock, also the son of a murdered political leader, to head up an international charity foundation. Meanwhile Russia saw its first transition of power since the end of the Soviet Union and British forces were instrumental in aiding the new President, Boris Nemtsov, in the successful rescue of the damaged submarine Kursk.
It seemed that Major had brought stability after the chaos of the last Labour government’s many changes of power, but at a charity cricket match in September 2000, he was struck in the head by a cricket ball and fell into a coma. He would not awaken until six years later—by which point many had written him off as a vegetable who would never regain consciousness, so his awakening reignited a debate about euthanasia—by which point the premiership had been held by six other people...
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This is amazing. I love some of the stuff you've done here, especially the call-back to Blair's guitar heroics (I remember reading an article about ten years ago where he was described as 'having done almost as much damage to the Fender Stratocaster's timeless image as Jeremy Clarkson has to Levi's'!) and that pitch-perfect Discworld reference for Major.
And, of course, Alliance 2000: The Liberals Do they keep that after the turn of the millennium, or do they revert to the Liberals again?
And, of course, Alliance 2000: The Liberals
Do they keep that after the turn of the millennium, or do they revert to the Liberals again?
And, of course, Alliance 2000: The Liberals
The German Greens are still formally named Bündnis '90/Die Grünen, they just tend not to emphasise the first half anymore, and though that's a very different situation, my guess is similar things will happen with the Liberals.