TLIAW: Who Governs?

[Nevran]

Re: the Libs. Ah, fair enough that's the sort of thing that can be hard to pick up between the lines in a timeline but once explained makes absolute sense and is a great addition to the story.

Re: a sovereign wealth fund: I think it's a mixture of both reasons. Maybe more so the short termist reasons you outline. In the long term it would of hugely strengthened nationalism in Scotland to have a pot of money worth XXX hundred billion, 90% of which is from tax and licensing revenue generated in Scotland and which is managed in London by predominantly English authorities.

In 2001 the Norwegian fund was worth around £75 billion. If the UK fund was worth £60 billion in the same time period (accounting for the difference in Norwegian and Scottish oil and gas deposits etc) that would be worth £12,000 to every Scot. 'Its Scotland's Oil' was potent in OTL, now imagine you can promise Scots you can make them £12,000 richer overnight...

Hmm. I'm not sure the SNP would push for a proportional system in the context of this timeline. Arguably in OTL it was the Liberal Democrats who were the driving force in ensuring De'Hont, with SNP support as they feared Labour dominance.

In this timeline the Libs are irrelevant. The Conservatives are a dangerous third party but unlikely to take the crown. It looks like a straight fight between the SNP and Labour, which the SNP can win by utilising the same 'blame Scottish labour for Westminster's problems' which they do OTL.

Of the three main actors only the Conservatives in Scotland might have a reason for supporting PR and I can't see them doing so.

No it's in both the SNP and Labours interest to keep FPTP in Scotland, until some third party (Lib Dems, SSP etc) disrupts the status quo.

Edit: Even in OTL there were some in the SNP arguing for getting rid of the party list part of D'Hont once they were in power.

Fair points.
Yeah, when I'm focusing on the people who become PM, those who don't sort of lose the attention, so the Liberals sort of get swept away by both the story and the political tides. RIP Cleggmania.

Absolutely, re the sovereign wealth fund. Of course, this asset is far too valuable to lose for London, so likely their calls will go unheeded just like in OTL. But you're damn right its going to be a hell of a campaign slogan and is why Margo MacDonald, who is pretty radical really, wins an majority in the Assembly election.

Course yeah, re FPTP. I conflate nationalists and the SNP, and I think it's probably fair to say that a proportional system reflects better on nationalist voters interests while a majoritarian system reflects well on the SNP (or any dominant party in an election system for that matter).

It was FPTP and it's going to remain first past the post then.

 

[Nevran]

Geoffrey Howe (Conservative) 1985-1992
The British disease is considering others more responsible than ourselves.​

Geoffrey Howe is so much more than the grey man that history has made him out to be. He was probably the only man (or woman) who could’ve brought the economic changes needed to Britain but do so without flaming out and bringing the experiment to early end. Compare Howe to his contemporaries, France’s D’Estaing, Germany’s Kohl and America’s Vander Jagt and you will find his efforts were far more successful. All four launched difficult and controversial programmes of denationalisations, austerity, and liberalisations and all would see their popularities crash. However, all but Howe would either be replaced or succeeded by left-wing figures who would undo a significant amount of their work and would be the generation defining figures that all these men strived to be. Howe, instead got to choose the time of his departure, put his hand-picked successor in office and changed the political consensus firmly in his favour.

Geoffrey Howe was born in Aberavon, to a Welsh speaking father in a comfortable home with a maid and two cars. Both his mother and father were county lawyers and would influence Howe’s decision to study law at Oxford. Joining the Oxford Conservative Association (chairing it in 1951), he would go on to become a competent and professional lawyer, representing 12 members of the Coal Board in the aftermath of the Aberfan tragedy and becoming a member of a Tory inquiry into the discrimination of women by the tax system.

Howe’s professional successes were tempered by him receiving a fair share of rejection by voters. First running for Aberavon (a safe Labour seat) in 1955 and 1959 and losing, before being elected to the marginal Bebington in 1964 and then losing it in the 1966 landslide, marked Howe. When finally elected to the safe Tory seat of Reigate in 1970 (East Surrey after 1974), he would finally have his chance with ministerial power.

Howe would be appointed by Heath to become solicitor general, overseeing both the Industrial Relations Act and the European Communities Bill. He would later serve as Trade and Industry Secretary, where he would negotiate with striking miners, secure significant private investment for the multitude of infrastructure projects begun by Heath and organise the IMF bailout.

Howe’s appointment as Chancellor of the Exchequer for 5 short months in February 1977 as the UK economy righted itself after the sterling crisis defined him, his policies, and his future. His tenure gave Howe his ideological bonafides, his political allegiances, his internal support and prove his dedication, worth and merit. As most of the public either chose to blame Heath or the IMF for the stinging cuts, Howe also managed to keep his political popularity. Of course, this did little to secure his immediate future as when Francis Pym became PM, Howe was quickly sent packing from Number 11. While replaced by Pym’s close ally William Whitelaw, Howe would become Chief Secretary of the Treasury, keeping close to power and to Whitelaw, informing many of the more controversial policies of the Pym government.

Howe would return from political obscurity returning as Chancellor after William Whitelaw was elected as Leader and PM. While Howe came under criticism for his “election give-away” budget in March 1983, which significantly cut taxes and business rates, it cemented his appeal to his colleagues.

With the Tory defeat and Whitelaw’s resignation, there was an opening at the top and Howe would take the plunge. His election as leader of the Conservative Party in 1983 was part due to his determination to get the job, and a lack of rivals. First, Howe secured the support of economic liberals. Keith Joseph was too old and too controversial. As was Nicholas Ridley. Margaret Thatcher meanwhile had been caught by implication in her son Mark’s illegal business dealings with sanctioned South Africa. Other candidates, like Cecil Parkinson, Ian Gow and Airey Neave were too inexperienced and too unknown. As such, he quickly got the support of most of his ideological allies, ignoring Norman Tebbit’s hard-right candidacy. And the years had been kind to the liberal wing, and they had grown exponentially in the party. With the One Nation wing split between Douglas Hurd and Peter Walker, and even some backing Howe, Howe was able to win a comfortable victory.

​

As Howe was leading HM Opposition during a period of a minority government, and an especially weak one at that, he had many opportunities to poke holes and attack. Even when Denis Healey would remark, humorously, that PMQs was like a pair of “dead sheep ravaging another”, Howe would often seem ahead of Hattersley and able to criticise the inevitable chaos and setbacks any minority government would face. Calling a vote of no confidence in October 1985, just after a rancorous conference period for Labour and the DSP split, gave Howe the advantage in the election.

Howe’s confident campaign, spearheaded by the Saatchi & Saatchi advertising agency, used images of Hattersley as a puppet, caught between Margo MacDonald and Roy Jenkins to portray Labour as weak. The economy was still weak. The country seemed to be divided and focusing on the wrong things. As such, the Conservative slogan was short and simple “We will fix it”. Voters agreed with Howe and booted Labour out of Number 10.

​

Howe (unlike his three predecessors) also had a less confrontational relationship with the Ulster Unionists. Backchannel agreements with UUP leaders before the election ensured there would be no Powellites standing in Britain, so as not to split the right-wing vote. Whilst Howe would’ve likely won a majority regardless, it most definitely padded his majority and seemed to have finally healed a wound that had troubled the Conservatives for a decade.

Howe would appoint a radical and fresh-faced cabinet, with many of those appointed unknown to wider public. As such, Lynda Chalker became Foreign Secretary, Leon Brittan Home Secretary and Cecil Parkinson was made Chancellor. Parkinson was an odd choice to sell the economic mission which Howe was so focused on. Afterall, Parkinson was the polar opposite of the ‘eye-rubbingly reassuring’ Howe, being ideologically vacuous but able to sell anything with a flair and a smile. For the early years though, their conflicting personalities would work in tandem to push through what was needed.

Howe also instilled in Parkinson the vision of his government. He emphasised it would be a hard road, but Britain had spent too long shirking responsibility and now it was time for the country to take its economic medicine.

As such, Howe and Parkinson would initiate radical and transformative liberalisation programme. Interest rates (already high to maintain the sterling’s peg with the Deutschmark) were cranked even higher to starve the economy of money and to (finally) reduce its ever-increasing supply. As to be expected, wages were slashed, mortgage rates and repayments spiralled upwards and saving money became far more amenable than spending. While the economy contracted sharply in 1986, inflation finally fell to below 5%, a quick win for the government.

Howe was also lucky, as after years of turbulence and generally stagnant growth, alongside the opening of new markets in Europe, the economy was finally had foundations for growth. Economic opportunities were plentiful and as energy and commodity prices were finally falling, the troubles which had defined the governments before seemed a thing of the past.

Howe would also launch a radical programme of denationalisation, which meant selling off state-run companies such as British Aerospace, British Energy, British Petroleum, Jaguar, British Leyland and British Telecoms. As Howe would justify denationalisation under auspices such as “market discipline” and “stakeholder society” he would face criticism. As Howe would be accused of “selling off the family silver” by former Prime Minister Harold Macmillan, most Brits would actually find denationalisation a net positive (the impressive marketing campaign, “Tell Sid” helped). Even if it was millionaires and billionaires like George Soros and investment capital capture firms, who would buy up much of the stock.

Howe would also, to an extent not seen with his predecessors, reinvigorate Britain on the world stage. Alongside the work of the long-serving Foreign Secretary Lynda Chalker, Britain would return as a present and committed party to world and European affairs. Howe’s close relationship with French President Pierre Mauroy and West German Chancellor Johannes Rau, saw Britain negotiate a significant rebate from the Common Agricultural Policy. Howe also pushed for the creation of the Europe-wide single market, nicknamed (ironically by British negotiators) the “Continental System”, the brainchild of former Commission President Geoffrey Rippon, a defining feature of the soon-to-be European Union.

Another improvement in foreign policy would come with Iran. Vander Jagt’s and Howe’s unwavering support for the democratic (and Western-aligned) Bakhtiar government in Tehran would finally pay dividends, as the democrats would finally beat the communist and Islamic revolutionaries. This would do a great deal to restore some form of normalcy to both the Middle East and global oil prices.

The domestic political effect of this ever-growing European integration finally ruptured the uneasy truce between so-called “national conservatives” and the Howe Government. When three backbench MPs (Neil Hamilton, Ann Widecombe, and Teresa Gorman) announced they were leaving the Conservative Party to form the National Conservative Party, they were laughed off much as the DSP was. When they later announced they would be aligned in a coupon with the UUP (linking in with those in Britain who remained the self-proclaimed successors to Powellism), there was a note of apprehension. And when all three would hold their seats in the 1989 election, it was clear they had tapped into something.

As 1989 came around, Howe called an election for the summer, and it was clear from the outset that it was going to be Howe’s to lose, despite the NCP. An irony of the Democratic Socialist Party was that Bryan Gould, elected Labour leader in 1986, was firmly of their tradition (being both a euroskeptic and firmly an economic interventionist/Keynesian) and stole much of their base and energy. As Eric Heffer and Frank Field of the DSP battled each other continually, Bryan Gould won the wider war between Labour and the DSP.

Gould would also be a modernizer of the Labour Party, democratising the party and instituting OMOV, while also bringing in women and ethnic minority candidates and expelling some of the Militant members of the party. Such reforms were much needed and gave Gould a bit of credibility.

Whilst some on the Jenkins/Hattersley wing would be accused of continually plotting against Gould, the appointment of Shirley Williams as a European Commissioner would take much of the fire out, by depriving the wing of its greatest asset. In turn other rivals, such as David Owen (re-elected as an Independent MP for Plymouth Devonport in 1986 after resigning the Labour whip after Gould’s election, and his own failed bid behind him) did not encourage or endear others to force another party split. After years of potential splits and challenges, it was clear to all now that being inside the tent was better than being outside.

But with Labour finally stable and despite Gould’s talents and charisma, it was clear the country had moved on from what he was offering. And as Gould would eventually realise, so had the Labour Party. As such, the 1989 election was a wash for Howe and saw unprecedented support for the Conservative Party (winning both the highest seat total since the war, and the highest recorded vote share to this day).

​

Howe’s second term was hoped to be much of the same but was instead opened by the “Big Bang” a dramatic attack by the New Irish Republican Army (nIRA) on the London Stock Exchange in October 1989. An anonymous phone call to the Met Police and a truck parked directly outside the London Stock Exchange meant an evacuation of the City of London.

The creation of the National Crime Agency with the Terrorism Act 1988 which had taken on operational counter-terrorism activities nationwide would help ensure that a quick, effective response followed, and the evacuation meant there were both no fatalities and minimal injuries, but the decimation of much of Old Broad Street.

As bombings would hit the UK throughout the rest of Howe’s tenure, including the deadly bombing of the Carlton Club which killed John Redwood MP, Howe would seek reconciliation. Working with Taoiseach Des O’Malley, Howe would lay a lot of the groundwork for future leaders to finally bring peace to Ireland, if never completing the act himself.

The economy, despite the terror campaign by the nIRA, continued to grow an accelerant helping with the deregulation of capital markets in insurance, credit, and banking. This would unleash a wave of easy money in the early 1990s which would fund an unprecedented rise in living standards (though most of this rise was funded by private debt). London, and especially Canary Wharf, which would undergo significant gentrification and regeneration spearheaded both by what was left of Hattersley’s ‘rudders’ and Michael Heseltine’s (as the long-serving City Minister) relentless, and politically opportunistic focus on big infrastructure projects.

A snag hit Howe’s government with Cecil Parkinson being forced to resign as Chancellor after allegations of him having an extramarital affair with a fellow MP (Sara Keays, the MP for Mitcham and Morden from 1989 to 1996 would later admit to the affair), Howe would appoint his good friend Leon Brittan as Chancellor, who would actually take to liberalisation with more zeal than Parkinson and pushed through even more denationalisations and tax cuts.

Howe would also enjoy a particularly close relationship with the world-famously prickly President Andrew Young. Young would enjoy a meteoric rise to the top from being elected Mayor of Atlanta in 1982, to Lloyd Bentsen’s running mate in 1984, to becoming Governor of Georgia in 1986 then finally elected President in 1988. Howe’s affable nature and ability to charm even the most difficult of people helped win over the President and win him to focus on world affairs. As the ‘special relationship’ reasserted itself and triumphant state visits to Buckingham Palace were organized for the trailblazing US President, Howe could claim to have helped bring back America to the world stage after years of political turbulence.

A source of tension in Howe’s second term would be that of Soviet Union which, despite an initial period of thaw at the end of the 1980s, would return to a diplomatic low point. The election of reformist Anatoly Lukyanov in 1987 to succeed Andrei Kirilenko (seen as a non-entity for years on account of his bad health, factional disputes, and short tenure of only 4 years before his forced retirement), was treated with optimism. One of his Lukyanov’s first acts was to meet President Vander Jagt in Iceland to open dialogue and beginning negotiations on a multilateral arms reduction treaty. Lukyanov also began a programme of economic reforms, called ‘otkritost’ – openness. These reforms involved bringing in market mechanisms to the Soviet command economy. authorising the selling of surplus goods by producers alongside cutting government support for failing businesses. It would be difficult, but necessary. Political openness would come in due time, and as Lukyanov announced the phased withdrawal of Soviet troops from Afghanistan, it seemed as if the Cold War had turned a new leaf.

However, when cameras captured images and video of tanks on Red Square this optimism was shattered. It transpired that military leaders and conservative Politburo members, led by Boris Pugo, had couped Lukaynov, blaming him and his capitalist reforms for the concurrent destabilisation of the Soviet economy and the impoverishment of its people. As all economic reforms were paused and the still throttled and censored media quickly sang Pugo’s praises, Western hopes were quashed.

As protests broke out across Eastern Europe (and in the Baltic nations), the Soviet military would roll across borders to secure the situation. As Erich Honecker appealed for Soviet support, it would be bloody images on Alexanderplatz that marked this call. The “New Freeze” had begun. Howe would roundly condemn the brutal scenes in the Eastern Bloc but like most Western leaders, could do little but shout from the sidelines.

Howe would spend the remainder of his time in office continuing denationalisations and liberalisation (culminating in the Trade Union Act 1991) and negotiating the Hamburg Agreement which both formalized the European Union and the European Monetary System. Both would drain Howe of significant time, energy, and political capital. And by early 1992, Howe, approaching seventy, along with a health scare, decided it was time to resign and was happy to do so on his own terms.

History has remembered Howe as a man who while not being a particularly effective orator or a man who inspired others with his energy and dynamism, what he did (and what history has credited him for) was his determination. And in the end, as Canary Wharf rose into the sky, powered by Howe’s economic experiment and as regular Brits felt richer, more respected and a lot freer than they ever did before, Howe’s determination paid dividends.

 

[Fenrisúlfr]

Another really great update!

A continuing cold war is going to have all kinds of butterflies...I get the sense it'll all end in tears.

Sorry for harping on about Scotland but the implications of the timeline you've written are really interesting. Looks like Labour's got 35 seats in Scotland, how many of them are marginal and ask falling to the SNP? If I was Labour I'd be really worried!

Also, demands for independence are going to ramp up if the SNP combine a majority in the Scottish parliament with winning most of the Westminister seats at the next GE! A nightmare for Labour and the Tories I reckon, esp if you get a very English presenting PM (like Cameron or the like).

 

[ExtremeMouse]

You always manage to find such great photos for your boxes. Interesting to see a more left wing America,a Margo MacDonald, successful Peter Tatchell, and a basically dead Liberal party. From this and Exocet I get the feeling you like using more moderate torys not there's anything wrong with that lol.

 

[Nevran]

Another really great update!

A continuing cold war is going to have all kinds of butterflies...I get the sense it'll all end in tears.

Sorry for harping on about Scotland but the implications of the timeline you've written are really interesting. Looks like Labour's got 35 seats in Scotland, how many of them are marginal and ask falling to the SNP? If I was Labour I'd be really worried!

Also, demands for independence are going to ramp up if the SNP combine a majority in the Scottish parliament with winning most of the Westminister seats at the next GE! A nightmare for Labour and the Tories I reckon, esp if you get a very English presenting PM (like Cameron or the like).

Thanks!

Rather than a whimper, it could all end in a bang...

First, the updates don't really cover Scotland so things aren't as bad for Labour above the border as it might seem from 1985. Sure Labour absolutely bombed 1985, but I'd say there's still a strong majority of Scots against independence, and you don't really shake off tribal allegiances that quick, especially in a pre-internet age.

Another thing I didn't cover was MacDonald's government, but I imagined that MacDonald, well, sort of imploded. She wouldn't get either get her dream of independence (let alone the powers to hold a referendum) and outside of minor concessions, Howe isn't going to give up that North Sea Oil. MacDonald (like OTL) is also going to rankle a lot of moderates on the SNP benches, who probably are fearful of fulling committing to a socialist agenda (and with the collapse of the Liberals, there's a lot of soft-nationalists and rural voters up for grabs). A fun fact though: the Scottish Assembly is in Glasgow rather than Edinburgh (cost implications win out along with plain old politicking).

1989 sees Labour return to form, or at least electoral competence, and George Robertson becomes the First Minister of a minority government. MacDonald resigns and the temporary leader George Reid, leads the party into the 1989 election, held a month after the Assembly election and sees the SNP keep a lot of their rural areas. The election of Margaret Ewing (a moderate, establishment and safe choice), tampers down the calls for independence in favour of realistic devolved powers and offers tacit support to Labour in Sauchiehall (rather than Holyrood).

Hope this explains a bit more about Scotland.

EDIT: Did a really bad job with those names, so fixed them to the people I actually meant.

You always manage to find such great photos for your boxes. Interesting to see a more left wing America,a Margo MacDonald, successful Peter Tatchell, and a basically dead Liberal party. From this and Exocet I get the feeling you like using more moderate torys not there's anything wrong with that lol.

Alamy and Getty Images are to thank for the pics. Glad you're enjoying as well and, well, it's always great to get rid of Thatcher.

 

[Nevran]

Leon Brittan (Conservative) 1992-1994
I think it's an act of petulance and arrogance to say not only do we demand what we demand, but we insist on taking it.
​

Leon Brittan was the ultimate personification of the now-fabled New Britain, the meritocratic build-it-yourself Britain, the ambitious go-get-it Britain. He and it were loud, outspoken, sure of its place in the world. And after years of malaise and hardship, a bit of confidence should be celebrated. But, for millions though, as unions, social clubs, churches and other social infrastructures crumbled, towns and villages depopulated and deindustrialised and many saw a future they weren’t going to be part of, New Britain had left them behind. And as Leon Brittan would find out, voters would leave him behind too.

Leon Brittan was born to a Lithuanian Jewish and Yiddish-speaking family, the son of a doctor and grew up in a modest home in North London. A scholarship boy, Brittan would work hard, getting into Trinity College at Cambridge, studying English and Law. He would go into law, practicing newspaper libel law and becoming respected in the field, his background in journalism preparing him for the rigours of a media-obsessed age.

Politically ambitious from the get-go, Brittan would run unsuccessfully in Kensington North in 1966 and 1970 before being elected in 1974 as the MP for Cleveland and Whitby (before boundary changes saw him moved to Richmond (Yorks) in 1983).

Now in Parliament, Brittan would quickly climb the greasy pole, his career adjacent to the meteoric rise of Geoffrey Howe, Brittan’s closest friend and political ally in the party. However, it would be under William Whitelaw that Brittan saw his jump into Cabinet, becoming Environment and Rural Affairs Secretary for a short stint, and in that period would court significant controversy amongst backbench MPs by beginning the push on both an expansion of central government power and the beginnings of the politically poisonous council tax/rate reform.

When Whitelaw lost 1983, Brittan would not find himself out of power, by virtue of being a close supporter and ally of Howe, who would go on to become leader. Howe would often consult with Brittan, placing Brittain within the “Trinity Testers”, a collection of cabinet members and Downing Street staff who studied at Cambridge (especially Trinity College). These men would be a de-facto ‘kitchen cabinet’ and soundboard for Howe, both in opposition and in Cabinet. As such, on top of being Home Secretary and later Chancellor, Brittan would have an outsized influence on policy and would often know decisions before Howe himself had made them.

When Howe announced his resignation, it was clear who would succeed him. There was legitimately no other contender to take the crown. As such, Brittan was elected unopposed and walked into Downing Street, a sense of satisfaction and smugness which marked the hubris which would define his tenure.

​

As Brittan became Prime Minister, you would expect a political honeymoon. That is what he and his party believed. He instead, would be besieged by events and leave the ordeal wounded. The prime example was the 1992 Birmingham Olympics.

Alongside the spiralling costs of the Olympics (which while revitalising Birmingham and opening a metro system for England’s third city), a series of construction and health and safety issues during the construction of the Olympic stadium meant that the stadium had to open at only 70% capacity, with TV cameras often focused on the empty seats in the dark and ugly stadium. A lackluster opening ceremony, riddled by audio and technical glitches damaged a lot of goodwill and positive publicity.

Along with the missing atmosphere, what also was missing from the Games was 16 nations, all those in the Eastern Bloc, protesting the IOC’s decision to East German athletes. The reason, (officially) was for wide-spreading doping and (unofficially) for the flagrant human rights abuses and the continued brutal crackdown on peoples and protest movements in the nation. The Soviet Union and its other satellite states chose to follow East Germany out of the games, with much vaunted plans for a ‘Workers Games’ to be held in place of the games.

And to top off all the controversy, Britain underperformed dramatically on the medals table.

​

In the grand scheme of things, a disappointing Olympics Games wasn’t the be-all-end-all. What would be, and what would change the course of history, was the assassination of the Soviet General Secretary Boris Pugo by Chechnyan separatists in October 1992.

After the bloody 1990 coup, Pugo had done little to establish himself as General Secretary, with his leadership inexorably tied to the whims of the CCP, hardliners and the Army and also had no clear successor. And with his death, a vacuum opened at the top, akin to the one which followed Stalin’s death. Every key interest in the USSR demanded a contradicting policy and contradicting man to lead the nation. The KGB, Army, Politburo, Council of Ministers, Ministries and every man and his dog fought to take power. The shambling Gennady Yanayev, an interim choice, did little to inspire confidence and his speech was cut short by a faction of the KGB seizing control of Moscow TV stations. Hardliners, military leaders, reformists, democrats, to almost every ethnic, social, and economic group all declared either independence or attempted to grab power. The rotting system finally crashed down.

As the Soviet Union broke down, protestors clashed with counter-protestors, firefights broke out on military compounds, officers fought against the other and nuclear submarines disappeared as commanders mutinied. Whilst the verbatim “end of history” now seems overblown, for those few dark months in the Autumn of 1992, the world waited with bated breath as a nuclear-powered state disintegrated.

The Eastern Bloc, with the Soviet Army fraying, also collapsed in on itself, the wave of public anger far too loud to ignore. The Eastern Bloc would also collapse in on itself, even the ‘Stasi’fied and brutally repressive East Germany, with the now memorable image of protestors with the German tricolour and the cut out communist seal draped on the columns of the Brandenburg gate.

When Mikhail Gorbachev emerged as the man who could unite the squabbling and warring factions, it was too late. While the Union of Sovereign States (Sovereign Union) would be formed, it would only be Russia and the Central Asian countries which remained under the same flag.

For Brittan, he left the crisis unsettled personally and with the public. What could’ve been a defining moment, with daily speeches to a scared public (the images shown by the Turner News Network and the lost nuclear material were widely reported, as was the engagement with a rogue Soviet submarine in the North Sea) instead went down like a lead balloon, Brittan’s tone often condescending and his words anything but reassuring.

When things calmed down by 1993, Brittan was able to return to domestic politics and found opportunities. Immigration, always a hot topic, had been mostly side-lined in the 1980s, but returned to the forefront, especially after a wave of immigrants from India and Pakistan. Both these nations were plagued by increasingly hyper-nationalist governments, with lines between immigrant and refugee blurred. Alongside, the continuing nIRA terrorism campaign and the rise of the underclass who were raising supposedly lawless and ‘generational criminals’ crime and punishment was at the top of the agenda.

The solution was the Secure Streets and Borders Act 1993. The SSABA has gone down as one of the more controversial pieces of legislation in post-war British history. Massively expanding the powers of the NCA to become akin to the British FBI, mandating police to stop-and-search, assigning “control orders” to opt people out of the protections given by human rights legislation, extending the right of police officers to detain criminals for 48 hours and for those charged with terrorism offences 90 days and imposing migration targets and refugee quotas. Almost every major provision in the bill contradicted both international law and many of the unwritten laws which governed British legal society.

Brittan proclaimed the law was needed to deal with the consequences of both the nIRA and a shocking rising in crime, especially in those areas which had seen deindustrialisation and decay. The Maxwell papers, usually loyal to Labour’s side, would back the bill, a sign of the editorial board’s decision to pander to more populist and right-wing audiences. Polling showed the wider public also backed the bill. Yet, civil society and social actors rose to highlight the flaws and fight the bill.

As the Leader of the Opposition decried the largest rollback of rights since Cromwell, Home Secretary Lady Thatcher of Finchley (a stalwart of the Conservative party, the architect of the bill and a close ally of Brittan) would be ruthless, unapologetic, and not for turning and forced it through the Commons. As hundreds of thousands marched and protested the Act (labelled the Surrender Act) as unions from the civil service, to police, to advocacy groups began to challenge every aspect of the bill and its effectiveness, Brittan and Thatcher would hold steady. Brittan’s gaffe that “If you’re not with us, you’re with the terrorists”, summed up so much about both Brittan’s strategy and his gaffe-prone and almost-farcical delivery. It would pass through the Commons though, significant political capital aside.

The House of Lords would then swing into action, flexing its political muscles, with a lot of the more liberally inclined Lords (a lot of those appointed by Heath, Pym, and Whitelaw) finding significant ideological and practical concerns with the bill. As such the Lords would attempt to amend and sandbag some of the more egregious policies, setting up votes in Commons designed to either change policy or embarrass the government. Even after this, the Law Lords, European Court of Human Rights, and other courts would spend their time hearing a multitude of legal arguments from advocacy groups and would strike down many of SSABA’s provisions which were seen as too onerous.

As Brittan would spend so much time battling with the Lords over SSABA, it would incidentally cause a new political headache for the government. Whilst peerages had always been an especially backhanded and grey area of British politics, the continual fights over SSABA meant that these appointees and appointments process saw scrutiny.

Howe and Brittan, with appointing many prominent businessmen and women to the upper chamber, had also taken significant political donations from such businesses either as part of the process or in parallel to the process. As the Guardian began to report on these dirty dealings, public anger grew. Of course, it wasn’t just limited to the Conservatives, Hattersley’s appointment of Lord Maxwell of Headington Hill stands was a glaring example of ‘both sides' discourse. The Queen herself also found herself having been dragged into the scandal, a constitutional crisis. But to many, it was one rule for the Establishment, who gave jobs to each other, and one rule for everyone else, who saw their jobs disappear.

At the same time personal sandals also began to hit the government with MPs such as Jonathan Norris, David Mellor and Norman Lamont got wrapped up in lurid sex scandals. As the scandals became wrapped unfairly under the moniker of “Brittangate” by a headline hungry press, Brittan was tainted by association.

Yet despite all the controversy, all the noise from protestors and papers, Brittan felt confident going into the 1994 election. The economy was good. Foreign relations had calmed down. Action had been taken on crime, punishment, and immigration.

But the election came down to a simple question, which Brittan found himself on the wrong side of. Simply, “Do you feel better than you did 5 years ago?”. So many voters didn’t. Euroskeptics lamented the rise of the European superstate. Environmentalists were still furious at the network of nuclear reactors polluting Britain. Socialists decried the marketisation of government. Nationalists saw the government slowly clawing back power from their nations and regions. Workers saw their rights eroding and livelihoods changing. It was just enough.

An irony is that Brittan’s successor would embrace the mantra of New Britain both more publicly and more enthusiastically than Brittan ever did. But perhaps, Brittan was the man who represented the worst excesses of New Britain. Selfishness, hubris, arrogance, all wrapped up by a sense of infallibility, traits which brought down a flawed man, tested by events and found lacking.

 

[Nevran]

Margaret Jay (Labour) 1994-2004
She is like a comet. She comes round once in a while and somebody gets hit.
​

Margaret Jay needs no introduction. But in lieu, Margaret Jay is the longest serving Prime Minister in modern times. She is woman who dragged the Labour Party into the 21st century into electability and into government. Jay is first, and certainly isn't the last, female Prime Minister. She was and still is a worldwide phenomenon, the first of what would be many "celebrity politicians". She is the “Scarlet Widow”, a nickname coined by the Indian newspaper the Mumbai Mirror during her visit to mediate the Kashmir War. She was named as such for her progressivism, her tangled web of relationships and her poisonous bite. A feminist, mother, fighter, a hurricane of a human being.

But first Margaret Jay is political royalty. The daughter of Jim Callaghan, one of the most prominent Labour politicians of the Wilson-era, Jay’s childhood was defined politics. Her father in Westminster and mother at home helping organise her local branch of the Fabian Society instilled in Jay her politics and her values. At Oxford, Jay would follow her family’s path, studying PPE and would meet Peter Jay, another scion of a Labour Party grandee. Falling in love, Jay would eventually become Jay’s husband and gave Jay her three children. While their marriage would end in the mid-1980s, they would remain close, with Peter Jay often accompanying his wife around the world during her premiership, hosting world leaders, attending conferences and summits.

Despite her political education and family, Jay was reluctant to enter Parliament, often rejecting multiple offers to do so by Labour Party organisers in the 60s and early 70s. Afterall, Jay was at the start of a promising career as a BBC journalist, alongside her husband’s career in journalism and to stay near her family while her children were still young negated any latent ambition for a parliamentary career.

However, as time moved on, Jay still had that ambitious spark. It only would be after Peter Shore himself commended Jay at an exclusive gathering of Labour MPs in Kensington, that Jay would be convinced. Backed to the tee by Shore, (seen as incentive to keep Jim Callaghan supportive of Shore’s floundering leadership), despite all the risks and discomfort and took the plunge, running for and winning Bishop Auckland in 1978. Yet, the Jay family would not be comfortable with Margaret’s new career. Jay herself was sad to be leaving London for Bishop Auckland, a Northeastern and aggressively working-class seat which she admitted was “nothing like home”. On top of this, the stress of moving North was seen by both husband and wife for ending their marriage (hushed-up affairs committed by both aside). Yet, as both father and daughter served in Parliament, Jay was a notable character in the party and parliament, often wearing bright pantsuits and dresses and proving to be a reliable and hard-working constituency MP at the same time.

On Hattersley’s victory, Jay would see her first ministerial role as a junior Health minister. Focused on the HIV/AIDS crisis, Jay would be instrumental in funding and laying the political groundwork for the sexual health clinics which sprung up in predominantly gay neighbourhoods. In 1984, with the resignation of Health Minister Eric Varley due to his poor health, Jay would surprising be promoted to become Health Secretary, a result of her family background and her past work. Unlike with Varley, Jay would focus almost solely on tackling HIV/AIDS, becoming one of the main figures in the fight against it.

The odd combination of Home Secretary Shirley Williams and Margaret Jay leading the government response would see both women lauded by the gay community with images of both women to this day still plastered on gay clubs and on posters in gay neighbourhoods.

Whilst her ministerial career would be cut short with Labour swept out of office in 1985; her rise would continue in opposition. Promoted by Bryan Gould to become Shadow Home Secretary, who recognised her talent and ability to make and keep connections, she was an effective surrogate for Labour on the campaign trail even despite some unfortunate gaffes on the trail. When Bryan Gould was forced to stand down in 1989 after the election, Jay would run for the leadership. Winning the support of the right of the party, her campaign was more popular with party members than MPs and unions, who distrusted her elitism and her accused ‘lack-of-commitment’ to the causes of the working class and unions.

After being knocked out in the third round of voting, Jay would be demoted to be Shadow City Minister under David Blunkett. Yet, Jay would again strike it lucky. David Blunkett, for his deeply inspiring story and his ability to embrace and overcome his disability to achieve professional success, was not an effective communicator, nor particularly popular with the public. And then, when Blunkett’s personal life and marriage unravelled as the News of the World tabloid reported on his many affairs and soon a lovechild came out the woodwork, he resigned as leader, to save himself and his family any more embarrassment.

Jay, to the surprise of no-one, ran again for the leadership, and learnt the lessons of 3 years before. With Frank Dobson, (his concurrent bid for Labour Deputy Leader, a joint candidacy the first of its kind) as her right hand, he helped balance out some of Jay’s more problematic issues and give her much needed trade union support. Jay would triumph over John Prescott and Gordon Brown, both men with questionable ability to appeal to the public and especially to those middle classes who gave Howe his majorities.

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Her early leadership had many of her critics (rightly or wrongly) accuse her of being a political lightweight, with her often contradictory policy positions not helping Labour get on a solid footing. While her strong position against the SSABA was laudable, it came at the loss of swathes of voters, social conservatives, and the tabloid press, and made attacks that Jay was “soft” on crime an easy argument to make. Jay also seemed to struggle with the intense public criticism and scrutiny on her now as Leader of the Opposition, with frequent gaffes. Jay tripping over when walking through a council estate in a bright white dress and in bright red kitten heels was the epitome of her early troubled leadership.

Jay was blessed though, with the fact that Leon Brittan was uncharismatic, gaffe-prone and widely disliked. 9 years into a controversial government and one which seemed increasingly disinterested was also a sandbag for his ambitions of a mandate. It was close, but no-one realised exactly how close it actually would be.

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When the exit poll was released, the country looked on in shock. It predicted that both parties would be tied, and it was smaller parties which would hold the balance of power. Frantic phone calls went out on the night and when Friday midday came around, Brittan’s Tories had won only one more seat than Jay’s Labour. It was expected that Brittan would be able to stitch together a minority government with the UUP/NCP Alliance. But, as most pundits recognised, you could never count out Jay’s ability to work a room.

A political animal since birth, Jay knew the phones to call, the people to sway, the promise to make and the arithmetic to back her up. The lessons of Hattersley’s minority government, the importance of maintaining support of their partners, was also at the forefront of Jay’s mind.

Jay quickly sent out feelers to centre-left nationalist parties in Scotland, Wales, and Ireland, promising them sweeteners, the biggest of which was electoral reform. While Brittan constitutionally deserved and declared he had the first shot of forming a government, Jay was piecing together a majority. Brittan would be locked in negotiations with the Alliance for 6 days, with the discussions consumed by mutual animosity and distrust. When civil servants and constitutional experts reported that Jay had the informal backing of the SNP, the Greens, the SDLP and Plaid Cymru, Brittan had lost the initiative. Immediately, Brittan departed for Buckingham Palace and recommended that the Queen send for Jay. The media derided her government as the “contraption” and doomed it to fail.

It was expected, like that last Labour minority government, that it would be locked in ideological and political disputes. But, only 87 days into office, the world changed. When Prince Charles stepped off his plane at Belfast International Airport, on a visit to see Lord Mountbatten, who was on his deathbed at his summer home in Sligo. Upon into his car, a single mortar shot was fired at him from a stationary truck in the car park. It struck the Prince of Wales’s car, killing him instantly. Camilla, the Princess of Wales, who was in the car behind escaped without injury.

Jay wrote in her autobiography that “time stood still” when her security adviser rushed her out of a European Summit meeting in Lisbon and told her the tragic news. Jay, in a moment of political brilliance, told the Irish Taoiseach Des O’Malley and asked him to issue a join statement. Agreeing, both leaders would stand shoulder to shoulder as Jay paid tribute to Prince Charles. Reciting the prayer of St Francis, Jay would then reaffirm her and her government’s commitment to the peace process, with Jay declaring, with tears in her eyes, that it was “darkest right before dawn”.

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In the wake of tragedy, when tested by events which could break even the strongest of men, Jay rose to the occasion. During the mourning period and state funeral which followed Jay’s popularity skyrocketed. Consoling a traumatised nation, Jay would step into the gap and give the space needed for the Royal Family to adjust to the loss. Side-by-side with the Duke of York, Prince Andrew, his ability to step into the role of heir apparent with the right amount of dignity and respect helped ease the transition.

From then on out, Jay had political firepower. The contraption, much to critics’ shock, got to work. She and the government focused on constitutional reforms of the House of Lords and voting system, social reforms and introduced many anti-corruption and political transparency bills. Shelving the more egregious parts of the SSABA was popular, as was a well-received and moderate budget. Alongside increased devolution of more powers to the regions of the United Kingdom, voters saw the government delivering. This strange contraption was working.

It also helped Jay that the opposition hit political turmoil. One of the highest risers in the Conservative Party, and the man who had been widely tipped as a future Prime Minister since 1982, Michael Heseltine was not living up to expectations. As he became the unpopular caricature “Tarzan”, bashing his chest (with his braided chest visible, at least on Spitting Image) with his boastful, inaccurate, and snake-oil salesman politics and speeches, Heseltine struggled to win over people.

Meanwhile the right wing continued to split as Heseltine’s liberal policies and confrontational approach sent many running to the now unified Unionist and Conservative Party (UCP). Led by the equally confrontational Ian Paisley, who was the surprise winner (and recent joiner) of the first UCP leadership contest. With more weight given to Northern Ireland members to make sure the vast membership of the NCP didn’t overwhelm their voices, Paisley who had integrated the DUP into the UCP in 1991, won in a landslide, despite having fought so hard against the UUP in the past. Paisley was highly controversial nationwide, and probably did more harm to the UCP brand than good.

While all these personality, electoral, and political wounds continued to harm the Conservatives, Jay, with the support of the contraption partners, called an election in the summer of 1996. It would also be the first election fought under Alternative Vote (AV), one of the main achievements of the contraption government.

Heseltine would often tie himself in knots justifying his positions on all issues, his much-vaunted charisma disappearing on the campaign trail. An irony was that the elitist Jay would seem, almost, down-to-earth in comparison to Heseltine. As such, Jay would campaign confidently on a positive message, choosing not to stoop down as Heseltine and Paisley fought amongst themselves. And as the economy was booming, with the first stages of the Information Revolution filtering into strong employment and stronger wage growth, Jay took credit for it. When Jay was voted in with the largest majority since Attlee himself, she was vindicated.

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It was time for Jay to make her mark. A brutal reshuffle followed the election, with Chancellor Jack Straw being the most notable victim. Chris Smith, a historic and ground-breaking replacement, who was far closer to Jay’s line of thinking would serve her well in the upcoming years. Whilst Dobson and Kinnock remained as Home and Foreign Secretary respectively, the lower ranks of Cabinet also faced significant changes, with many of those who cut their teeth in the divisive Hattersley & Gould years removed from power and replaced by fresh faces and soon-to-be Jay loyalists.

With this cabinet reshuffle, and a sizeable majority, Jay turned on the spending taps and began pouring money into the NHS, social care, and education. Leaning heavily of the “New Britain” mantra, progressive priorities would finally be actioned, the legacy of years of Conservative government washed away. Environmental targets, progressive taxation, state, and foreign aid boosts all contributed to a multilateralist Britain returning to the world stage. When Jay would sign the (London)Derry Accords in 1997, finally bringing an end to the Troubles and a return to self-governance for Northern Ireland, it seemed as if Britain had turned a page.

What would soon come to dominate, becoming Jay’s greatest controversy, and her legacy, was the Florin. It would be her support for the European common currency (named the Florin) which nearly broke her party and her country. This single currency was the dream of pan-Europeanists, economic and social liberals, and the growing metropolitan, interconnected, multiethnic and hyper-mobile communities which held so much sway over British politics. Margaret Jay, who wanted to remake Britain as a modern, equal, and truly European country, naturally and passionately supported the Florin. However, much of her party didn’t.

Labour was as much the party of Tony Benn, Peter Shore, and Bryan Gould, as it was of Roy Jenkins, Roy Hattersley, and Margaret Jay. Attempts to unilaterally adopt the Florin, Jay stances and what she wanted the official government policy to be, would rip apart Labour. Bryan’s Gould dramatic and ill-tempered resignation as a Labour party MP, after leaked cabinet discussions on the Florin in 1997, followed by angry editorials and MPs of all stripes questioning such a policy, seemed set to spark a civil war within the party. With these questions, it was also clear that Labour still had a significant number of euroskeptics on the backbenches. As such, Jay was forced to compromise and announced a referendum would be held in 1998, asking Brits to choose their future.

Jay would lead the Yes campaign, her passionate speeches and considerable public presence an advantage to the campaign. As the establishment would jump to support the Florin, a highly divisive and quixotic No campaign, divided amongst itself with odd bedfellows such as Bryan Gould, Teresa Gorman and Frank Field did little to win over voters.

It was a lot to ask of Brits, to ditch the pound and put their trust in Europe. But, Jay was used to overcoming impossible odds. It was time to make history once again.

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As Britain backed the Florin and the upcoming new millennium seemed to cement the dream of a progressive and open Britain which Jay had fought so hard for. Jay knew though that many were still neglected from “New Britain”, clearly illustrated by the divides created by the Florin referendum.

Making it a new government mission to focus resources and attention on such places, Jay pledged to “Build Up Britain”. Significant government resources and investments flooding into areas which had faced significant economic restructuring and deindustrialisation. Such investments were focused on constituencies like the PMs, such as Bishop Auckland, allowing more and more people to join in on the Information Revolution in new start-ups focusing on electech and eNet provision. As the economy also reaped the reward of a positive vote in favour of the Florin, private investments began to surge in from both Europe and America, the government could clearly make the argument that “You’ve never had it better”, to steal a line from a campaign gone-by.

With an election called for May 2000, Jay would find little challenge in securing re-election. Edwina Currie, who had done much to rebrand the Conservative Party and was outspoken on so many issues, still struggled to cut through to the wider public and past her party’s infighting. Currie’s lukewarm support of the Florin did little to win over UCP voters as many moderates and centrists were turned off Currie’s often flamboyant and controversial statements. If Edwina Currie was the Conservative mirror to Margaret Jay, she represented the untested Jay of the early Nineties. Polls were correct when they predicted that Labour would win handily, but would lose a few seats, a realistic scenario considering the landslide Jay received in 1996.

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The long end for Margaret Jay, began in 2003, with the retirement of Foreign Secretary Neil Kinnock. Losing one of the best and most effective Foreign Secretary’s since the war would cause any government distress, but Jay herself appointed a relatively untested successor, and grabbed many responsibilities of the role, which unsettled many in government and the party.

Her frequent trips abroad, attending foreign conferences, to mediate conflict across the world (such as in Kashmir, Kuwait, and Venezuela) and her close and unusual friendship with President Antonin Scalia also started to impact her polling ratings. Jay was always seen as elitist, but her increasing neglect of domestic politics and voters, was an unforgivable offence. Passing her ninth year in office, Jay was also the longest serving PM in recent times, and it was clear to many that she had overstayed her welcome.

It was also in the early 2000s that the stress of the job would weigh down Jay. Sexism played a role, of course, but Jay began to seem distracted, and questions around her age began to poke at the PM. The Today’s headline: “Doesn’t She Look Tired?” only confirmed this, as a wave of public anxiety at the Prime Minister health and age followed. As Jay passed retirement age, most voters agreed that Jay should step down sooner rather than later.

When Labour’s and Scotland’s new First Minister Malcolm Chisholm admitted that voters were getting “tired of applauding [Jay]” he unwittingly captured the mood of the nation. What once would’ve been lauded soon became treated with apathy. As Jay won a Nobel Prize for finally bringing peace to Cyprus with the Dhekelia Framework, she would find little support left in Westminster for future endeavours.

A botched reshuffle was the final straw. As the cabinet rounded on the prime minister, the instrument of her downfall was a letter. Hand-written by Health Secretary Hazel Blears, signed by many other cabinet ministers, they all called on the PM to go. It became known as the “Scarlet Letter”, a play on the salacious relationships and affairs which Jay had been accused of most of her professional life. And upon receipt of the letter, Jay recognised she was at the end.

Her final request would that her party would let her serve her country for exactly ten years, (she would officially resign as PM a day after this milestone was met). This also let Jay focus on an issue close to her heart, allowing her to see through the passage of the Marriage Act 2004, which extended the right of marriage to gay couples. A crowning achievement, and in favour of a community which Jay had personally empathised with and supported for all of her career, it was a landmark bill for her to conclude her premiership.

Jay would not leave public life though. Perhaps due to their shared bond during difficult times, Jay would be informally known as the Queen’s favourite Prime Minister. Seeing through the assassination of Prince Charles, organizing the Golden Jubilee in 2002, Jay had been a steadfast presence throughout. And, to mark this and at the request of Jay herself, the Queen attended a royal banquet for Jay on her resignation.

And so, with this relationship, shortly after her resignation as MP and PM, Jay would be asked to tutor a future Queen in-waiting, Princess Beatrice, as she made the difficult transition from teenager to heir apparent. As scandal would consume the Royal Family, Jay’s tutelage would prove invaluable to Beatrice at an especially difficult time for the royal family. Moulding the future, Jay would also go on to serve in multiple roles for international NGOs promoting human rights and health charities.

Defining Margaret Jay is difficult. Explaining her impact is even harder. But, the fairest assessment is that it was Margaret Jay who made New Britain, with all of its strengths and all of its weaknesses.

 

[Nevran]

Peter Hain (Labour) 2004-2009
You can get on with your job. I'm going to get on with mine.
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Peter Hain, so far in British political history, has been forgotten in between the shadows of his predecessor and his successor. Booted from office deeply unpopular, dragged down by a recession and a contentious political record, it is far easier to gloss over Hain’s tenure than return to the difficult debates and painful memories of the late 2000s. But his time, his life, and his work deserve so much than to be a footnote.

Born and raised in apartheid South Africa, this period of Hain’s life was defined by his parents, both anti-apartheid activists, and the apartheid system and regime’s injustices. Both instilled in Hain a sense of justice, determination and radicalism. This was only encouraged by both he and his parents being forced into exile in 1966, fleeing South Africa. As such, Hain now in London, would become, like his parents, deeply entwined in activism.

Hain became a leader in various civil rights groups, including anti-Nazi and anti-apartheid leagues and focused significant energy on campaigning to stop all-white South African sports teams and touring in the early 1970s. The effects of Hain campaign would lead to the isolation of South African sports on the world stage and have been accredited to beginning the conversation of sanctions, which would ultimately come into effect during Pym’s premiership.

Hain, despite some successes, faced his fair share of setbacks and challenges to his work, including both a conviction for criminal conspiracy and being tried for a 1975 bank theft, with Hain framed by the South African Bureau of State Security (BOSS). He was also sent letter bombs by the South African Security Services in 1972, in retaliation to his boycott campaign, and then another in 1979, for his successful campaign to sanction South Africa. Such actions would not stop Hain though.

Politically, Hain’s allegiances were relatively fluid in his early years. After spending a few years as a Young Liberal, Hain would, like so many other of his activists, would leave the party in the late 1970s. With the Liberals imploding after both the lurid sex and attempted murder scandal implicating Thorpe and then the cover-up of the hitman brought down both Steel and Hooson in the cover-up. Moving to Labour, Hain would join the party in 1981 as Hattersley managed to paper over the cracks and divisions.

Running for Putney in 1985, Hain would be ultimately unsuccessful in his bid, losing in the backdrop of the Tory victory. Hain would not be in the shadows for long and would be selected for the safe Labour seat of Vauxhall in 1989 and would work diligently in shadow cabinet for the 5 years of opposition. When Labour finally entered government in 1994, Hain would see himself become a junior minister in the Foreign Office, serving as Africa minister for 5 years.

While South Africa had already transitioned to democracy by Hain’s time, he would mediate other flare-ups on the continent, resolving the Sierra Leone political crisis, extending significant famine relief and development efforts to Ethiopia, and putting debt forgiveness on the agenda in time for the new millennium.

Hain would later be promoted in 1997, to become Northern Ireland Secretary, where he would help negotiate the (London)Derry Accords. While Hain would struggle with a lack of legitimacy from unionists, especially considering his republican views and alleged bias towards the nationalists, he would nonetheless manage to bring almost all parties around the table.

With the Northern Ireland office becoming a clear launch-pad for future Prime Ministers (Pym and Whitelaw had both served in this office), most began to naturally see Hain as a upcomer in the party, and he did little to dissuade his colleagues of this notion. His close relationship to both Jay and Foreign Secretary Neil Kinnock helped this image and he soon gained significant institutional support as a result.

Hain would become known to the public at large by becoming one of the faces of the “Yes” campaign for the Florin. While this saw Hain face a lot of vitriol, his public facing role helped heighten his profile with the public at large, who began to recognise Hain’s face on the telly.

Hain’s promotion to Foreign Secretary in 2002 after Neil Kinnock’s retirement would raise eyebrows. It was clear that whoever would be Foreign Secretary would be arguably the front-runner for the next Labour leadership contest and and Jay’s increasing focus on foreign affairs as domestic politics turned sour, seemed to set whoever occupied the chair as her de-facto protégé.

As such, when Hain was one of the few in Cabinet to not turn on the PM and sign the “Scarlet Letter”, it was clear who’s side he was on. An irony is that Hain only chose not to sign the letter, due to his presence at a 2004 Bandar Abbas G13 break-out summit of foreign ministers, rather than any loyalty to the PM. This distinction was lost on Jay though, who would remain highly influential in the Labour party even after her dismissal.
The 2004 Labour leadership election saw almost every potential candidate who could run, run. From Peter Tatchell; to Paul Boateng; to Charlie Kennedy; to Vince Cable; to Wendy Alexander; to Alan Johnson; to Stephen Byers, every man and their dog was in the race. As expected, Hain was among these.

Hain could point to his years of work in Northern Ireland and as Foreign Secretary to claim he “could hit the ground running from day one” and (along with Vince Cable), was one of the Labour candidates who polled most favourably against Liam Fox, the Conservative leader, a widely disliked figure on Labour benches. And in the end, MPs, unions and members voted pragmatically and with their eyes on the polls. A sign of how Labour had changed under Jay and how far it was from both the Shore and Gould leaderships was the fact that two frontrunners were both former Liberals.

Cable offered a form of reset to the Jay years, something which many MPs desperately wanted, even if they couldn’t actively campaign on it. Cable was also a right-winger in the party, arguing in favour of liberalisations, denationalisations through Anthony Giddens inspired and informed “Third Way” politics. So much so, a point of contention in the campaign was Cable’s multiple comments directly praising both Heath and Howe.

While Hain was more left-wing, he was still firmly in the Jayite consensus. This meant that as the contest got underway, Hain was able to win over both these wings of the party. It meant that Hain was able to get a good, solid margin and be elected Labour leader and Prime Minister.

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Hain also took on the historic distinction of becoming the first ever Labour leader to become Prime Minister without a general election, and so knew that he would need a democratic mandate to remain. Hain accordingly moved to unite his party behind him. His major rivals were all appointed to prominent positions and a “cabinet of all talents” was the buzzword, aggressively briefed by Labour spin-masters. Vince Cable became Chancellor, Charlie Kennedy became Home Secretary and Wendy Alexander was moved to the Foreign Office. Other rivals were given prominent cabinet positions with beefed up departments. And after the years of the centralization of power under Jay, it was a refreshing change of pace for many party members and MPs. It also helped that Hain’s choices were competent, capable and charismatic and represented a clear ‘changing of the guard’.

And then, Hain, only two months after becoming Prime Minister, announced that he was calling a snap general election for October 2004. History had seemed to show that when Prime Ministers resigned with less than a year remaining in the parliamentary term, their successors, who chose not to call an election, were doomed. Not wanting to go down the well-trodden path of Douglas-Home, Whitelaw and Brittan, Hain defied his more cautious instincts, colleagues and history and took the plunge.

Hain would go into the election swinging and on his terms. Fox himself admitted that Hain’s snap general election caught him and the Conservatives on the back foot, who spent multiple weeks arguing among themselves on policy and personality, rather than taking the fight to Labour.

Hain also proved an effective campaigner and was especially resilient to the rigours of a barnstorming campaign. His Cabinet having retired many of those from Jay’s premiership, gave the party a new energy and a score of legitimately popular figures to make speeches and shake hands. Economic credibility kept the middle-classes on side, and a slew of policies including a National Care Service and further devolution deals won over left-wingers. It was a good campaign.

Liam Fox, the Conservative leader, who had from his election as leader had been derided as being the product of Tory infighting. A right-winger who proposed a second referendum on the Florin, his policies were firmly outside the political mainstream by 2004. An irony was that most of his more right-wing agenda was shelved by his Shadow Cabinet and special advisers, yet Labour was able to make the case that Fox was a product of the past, who cared more for navel-gazing on Europe than for governing.

The UCP also kept growing, with Liam Fox’s decision to open the door to potential coalition talks after the election seen to have legitimatised the party to many social and national conservatives.

When voters went to the polls, the exit poll predicted a Labour minority, but as results came in, things were got better and better for Labour. Hain would thus return with a majority, a remarkable achievement for a government 10 years in power. And so, with a mandate of his own, and a historic fourth term for the Labour Party, Hain returned to Downing Street.

Hain had clear ambitions for his time in office and a legitimately ambitious agenda followed. Having focused on the campaign trail on “cradle to grave”, to steal a phrase from Beveridge, Hain turned his government’s attention and ministerial energy on easing spiraling childcare costs and creating a long-term solution for social care. It was much easier said than done.

While Hain and Cable were able to push through very generous childcare tax credits, and the establishment of universal childcare provision for those in lower-paid jobs, significant issues sprung up. The majority of the cost burdens still fell on parents, and the increased bureaucracy created a “two-tier” childcare system, with those children who qualified for free care often going to less well-funded nurseries, and a bidding war for places in expensive, fully private-funded nurseries.

It was social care which took most of the government’s energies. And after years of committees, ministerial actions, civil service churn, came the biggest reform to social care in modern history, with the creation of the National Care Service. NCS aimed to bring retirement homes, hospices, council facilities under the central government umbrella, much in the same vein as the National Health Service had done to healthcare facilities in 1948. As such local authorities, who had previously run these services, would see their responsibilities revoked. Instead care homes and services would be controlled by local, regional and national boards, with the chain going all the way up to ministers and the national governments (Scotland, Wales, Northern Ireland and the Northeast had their own off-shoot regional NCS umbrella). It would be elected officials who became directly responsible and accountable, tasked with meeting targets and providing much-needed social care.

The government argued that NCS would end the “postcode lottery” and establish a universal and high standard of social care nationwide. Ministers would also argue that such reform was critical to ensuring the NHS’s long-term survival and to reduce costs for hospitals which could offload patients to the NCS.

NCS would take years to implement, coming into effect in January 2009 and would face significant challenges. Its overly bureaucratic nature soon saw headlines accusing NCS committees (so called “death panels”) of sending vulnerable and elderly people miles away from their homes and families, to be placed in dilapidated care facilities. Scandals of underpaying hospices and charities for buildings and facilities would cause crisis. Social care workers in NCS, would also unionize and protest, fighting tooth-and-nail against NCS, continually criticizing the lackluster board plans to support wages and keep local knowledge empowered. The costs of NCS would balloon as well, to well over 30 billion spent per year on the service in 2023. Yet Hain fulfilled his promise and solved the problems of long term social care.

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But all these government expenditures would be significantly costly, and the Leader of the Opposition would often call-out “pork-barrelling” spending and the so-called “loose pockets” of the Labour Party. Hain and Labour, to achieve much of its agenda, was forced to take on well-funded and well-entrenched pressure groups and associations which soon turned wholesale against the government. Hain also did little to assuage green voters, (perhaps the intransigent American government did little to progress international climate agreements), but his failures to either roll back nuclear power or introduce substantial environmental legislation left a major opening for the Green Party for future elections.

Looking across the Atlantic, America would become a source of concern and trouble for both Hain and the global economy. Governor Ron Paul, by surfing eNet boards and backed by a new generation of right-wing activists, had won the White House in ‘04. Paul’s strict constitutionalism however, and chaotic nature led to market turmoil while his often-contradictory approaches to international affairs caused significant tensions with long-standing American allies, including Hain.

Unilaterally pulling American troops out of Venezuela in 2005 was widely criticized and led to even more stress for the war-torn South American nation. As rival governments in Caracas and Maracaibo formed, oil fields burned, and prices shot up. This event has been marked as the beginning of the “Spiralling Recession”.

The recession truly hit American consumers when Enron collapsed, the company finally brought down as the web of corruption and corporate malfeasance was exposed. Exacerbating the energy crisis, caused by the collapse of such a flagship provider, was the fact that CITGO, sold to Enron in 2006 after the collapse of the Venezuelan PDVSA oil company, also went bust. And as oil and energy prices destabilised, the 2007 Stock Market crash followed.

As the market got spooked by the energy crisis, other practices became exposed. What had begun as risky deals gone bad on Wall Street, led to junk bonds scaring banks from lending to each other, to the wholescale collapse of the financial sector with banks, insurers and even the housing markets collapsing.

Ron Paul’s ideological principles held firm in the crisis, and with his failure to agree and pass a suitable stimulus and bailout package, the crisis got even worse. Economists began calling it a “Second Great Depression”. The economic crisis was easily akin to the 1930s, in terms of the scale of suffering and damage done.

In Britain, the crisis was mercifully less brutal than in America. A better response helped. Vince Cable, firmly entrenched in Number 11, would react quickly with bailouts, government spending and tax cuts to fix the economy. Dipping into the capital spending budget and sovereign wealth fund, money was pumped into the economy. While HS2 would remain a government priority, other infrastructure projects were shelved, to better reprioritise government resources. HS2’s first leg would open in 2009, even if the other legs would only open years behind schedule with significant cost overruns.

The crisis took all the government’s energy. While a notable achievement was the agreement with German Chancellor Jürgen Rüttgers to suspend Florinzone rules on deficit spending, maintaining Florinzone alignment saw the government’s hands tied. With limited control over monetary policy and government spending not strong enough to fix the economy, the response was still underwhelming. As such, and as the years went by, the economy remained stagnant, and Hain’s premiership and government crumbled.

No matter the fiscal stimulus, or welfare allocated, voters were hit hard by the crisis, and they blamed Hain. As polls grew worse, as defeats mounted and as the government fell into a minority it all to the inevitable. Especially compared to the new dynamic American President, Hain was seemingly left spluttering in the dust. And so, when the election finally came in the Autumn of 2009, Hain thought things could not get any worse. And then, five suicide bombers attacked Manchester.

On the underground, in shopping malls and in train stations, the course of history changed. A simultaneous attack in New York was also carried out. Hundreds were dead. Pakistani national Abid Naseer, responsible for planning the attack and participating in it, left a manifesto pledging his allegiance to “al-Qāʿidah”. It was then clear to intelligence services that Pakistan, embittered and radicalised by the brutal Kashmir War, had either wilfully ignored the growing terror network in its nation or had even funded/contributed to the attack.

As a sign of respect, all political campaigning was suspended for two weeks, and the nation went into mourning. When campaigning resumed, the writing was on the wall. Hain would go down in defeat, as expected. He would send for the Queen to invite the Leader of the Opposition to form the next government, and thus ended 15 years of Labour Government.

The election showed that times had changed. A new approach was needed.

 

[Tanner151]

“Dynamic American president?” Hmm. Wonder who it could be. Also, Ron Paul as president? Oof. Like his anti-interventionism and can be a good thing but only when peace reigns. With terrorism around the world and an unstable Venezuela that might not have been the move to do at this time. I guarantee he’s vetoing a LOT of bills for not being ‘constitutional.’

Sad to see there is no effort in environmentalism as of yet.

Is al-Qa’idah just another spelling of al-Qaeda or is it an entirely organization?

Well Hain did some good social policies and his government’s reaction to the Spiraling Recession/Second Great Depression was at least quick with good ways to stimulate the economy. Hopefully the Tories don’t do austerity measures. That’ll just extend the pain.

 

[Nevran]

“Dynamic American president?” Hmm. Wonder who it could be. Also, Ron Paul as president? Oof. Like his anti-interventionism and can be a good thing but only when peace reigns. With terrorism around the world and an unstable Venezuela that might not have been the move to do at this time. I guarantee he’s vetoing a LOT of bills for not being ‘constitutional.’

Sad to see there is no effort in environmentalism as of yet.

Is al-Qa’idah just another spelling of al-Qaeda or is it an entirely organization?

Well Hain did some good social policies and his government’s reaction to the Spiraling Recession/Second Great Depression was at least quick with good ways to stimulate the economy. Hopefully the Tories don’t do austerity measures. That’ll just extend the pain.

I'll be honest and say I've been having fun picking obscure, (slightly batty) US Presidents in the background to to actual story. The next one might be one of my favorites actually.

No Chernobyl to kick start the movement damages the cause and a Labour government not as committed to environmentalism as they could be, are both bad signs for the environmental movement in the UK. Even if the Greens are reliably winning seats, they're not getting much done through government.

Just a different spelling to add a bit of flair.

Hain was a good/passable Prime Minister who governed in a difficult time. But compared to the rockstar who came before him, and the [REDACTED] who follows, hopefully I can get across that he is sort of forgotten. That's unfortunately, the plan for him.

 

[Tanner151]

I'll be honest and say I've been having fun picking obscure, (slightly batty) US Presidents in the background to to actual story. The next one might be one of my favorites actually.

No Chernobyl to kick start the movement damages the cause and a Labour government not as committed to environmentalism as they could be, are both bad signs for the environmental movement in the UK. Even if the Greens are reliably winning seats, they're not getting much done through government.

Just a different spelling to add a bit of flair.

Hain was a good/passable Prime Minister who governed in a difficult time. But compared to the rockstar who came before him, and the [REDACTED] who follows, hopefully I can get across that he is sort of forgotten. That's unfortunately, the plan for him.

Slightly batty U.S. presidents? Fingers crossed for Howard Dean or Paul Wellstone.

 

[ExtremeMouse]

Slightly batty U.S. presidents? Fingers crossed for Howard Dean or Paul Wellstone.

Wellstone wasn’t batty in like any way

 

[TGW]

Just now read through the whole thing and I have to say, I really appreciate not going for some of the obvious choices here! Honestly Margaret Jay sounds pretty bloody awesome as a PM, and Hain is pretty fine as well!

Also President Ron Paul made me gag at the thought, particularly seeing him manage to Magoo his way into a full blown financial crisis! Definitely not intending to step on your toes or anything but I'd be curious to see a full list of Presidents by the end of this, be funny to see how nuts the US got along the way.

And I hear the ominous sound of drums in the distance which means that the Tory Drought is over....dear god help us all!

 

[Tanner151]

Wellstone wasn’t batty in like any way

I know, but a Wellstone presidency would be interesting. That’s what I meant. I should have made that more clear.

 

[KingSweden24]

This is excellent - would expect nothing less from you, of course.

Excited to see how it wraps up

 

[Nevran]

Slightly batty U.S. presidents? Fingers crossed for Howard Dean or Paul Wellstone.

Wellstone wasn’t batty in like any way

They're definitely a hipster pick and that's all I'll say.

Just now read through the whole thing and I have to say, I really appreciate not going for some of the obvious choices here! Honestly Margaret Jay sounds pretty bloody awesome as a PM, and Hain is pretty fine as well!

Also President Ron Paul made me gag at the thought, particularly seeing him manage to Magoo his way into a full blown financial crisis! Definitely not intending to step on your toes or anything but I'd be curious to see a full list of Presidents by the end of this, be funny to see how nuts the US got along the way.

And I hear the ominous sound of drums in the distance which means that the Tory Drought is over....dear god help us all!

Thank you! Margaret Jay is easily one of the best parts of the TL and what I wanted to get down on paper (and probably one of the main inspirations for the TL).

I know I said earlier in the TL I'm trying not to get caught up in America, but I'm sure I can do something like a leaders list for key countries.

*CLAXON SOUNDING*

This is excellent - would expect nothing less from you, of course.

Excited to see how it wraps up

Thank you, goodsir

 

[C2sg]

Interesting that ITTL its Margaret Jay who takes the place of being the first woman prime minister (and from Labour, not the Tories) and serving almost as long as Thatcher

 

[Nevran]

Andrew Mitchell (Conservative) 2009-2017
The UK public have repeatedly shown enormous generosity to those in need.​

As we get closer to the present day, the dual effects of political memory and tribal loyalty will inevitably begin to cloud our perceptions of our leaders. With such as a caveat to this entry, Andrew Mitchell stands as both one of the longest serving Tory PM since the war, and as the leader who was betrayed by his own party, and succeeded by a man of his own cloth, who cared little for his legacy. Mitchell who had fought hard to change the Conservative Party was himself brought down by a changed party.

To begin, Andrew Mitchell, like so many of his contemporaries, was born into a political family. His father (like Pym’s, like Jay’s), was an MP for Basingstoke, who served as a junior minister in multiple different departments during the Howe and Brittan years. Growing up surrounded by both politics and the Conservative party naturally led to Mitchell’s future career.

After graduating college, Mitchell joined the Royal Tank Regiment as a second lieutenant on a Short Service Limited Commission (a scheme designed to encourage teenagers to apply to Oxford or Cambridge), spending time in the British military bases in Cyprus, where he would gain his affinity for foreign affairs.

Such service allowed Mitchell to progress academically, getting into Oxford. Mitchell who went on to read History at Jesus College, would also serve and be elected as both the Chairman of the university’s Conservative Association and then the President of the Cambridge Union.

Mitchell, was seen as a rising star from the get-go, serving as a member in the Hounslow Council before being elected to the neighbouring (and safe liberal Tory seat) of Richmond Park in 1994, placed on a short-list and bumped ahead of various local candidates.

Cutting his teeth during the difficult years of Opposition, Mitchell would align himself with the liberal one-nation wing of the party, but was loyal to Heseltine, Currie and Fox during their respective times as leaders. It would be during Fox’s time as leader though that Mitchell began to be noticed by the public. Such notice soon meant he was being talked up by party insiders as a future candidate and potential PM.

Becoming Shadow Chancellor in 2001, Mitchell who had cautiously backed adoption of the Florin in 1998, was a moderating voice against Fox’s ardent euroskepticism. While Fox would often make contradictory claims on the Florin, speaking of his hope to reverse the referendum result, Mitchell would work within the party to strike such pledges from the manifesto and forcing Fox to agree that the Florin was “at present a settled issue”.

Mitchell would work hard though to keep euroskeptics on side (cognizant of his future leadership ambitions). Mitchell solution was to put the Florin under a political and economic “lock”. Framing his arguments for the future, rather than present, Mitchell would argue that if public opinion and economic conditions changed, then policy would change. It was a difficult circle to square, but Mitchell was able to do it, and kept both wings of the party comfortable.

Fox’s defeat in 2004 was not a surprise, even if the Labour majority stung. Fox tried to hang on but was forced out over Christmas. As such, when the ballot opened, it was clear that Mitchell was the frontrunner. With changes to the leadership contest allowing party members to vote, (deciding between the two finalists on the MPs ballots), Mitchell’s public presence greatly helped him. With the three previous leaders being larger than life, it was expected a more moderate campaign would follow. As such many chose to sit out the contest, and with little ideological difference, the leadership election was more akin to a popularity contest. As such it was Mitchell and McLoughlin, respected and popular shadow cabinet ministers who moved to the members' ballot.

When Mitchell emerged triumphant over Patrick McLoughlin, he also had a significant mandate with it. He was then able to take the reins of the party far harder than any leader before him and begun the difficult process of modernizing the party. Pushing through pre-candidate selections and instituting quotas for both female and ethnic minority candidates, Mitchell’s early leadership was defined by him trying to rebrand his party, making it fit for a post-Jay world. He called his rebrand, “Progressive Conservativism”, looking to and emulating Canada where the PC juggernaut was celebrating its 15th year in office.

Mitchell was lucky as well, as his party seemed ready for change after years trapped in opposition. The Government was also struggling, first with implementing difficult policies and then by economic turmoil. Mitchell was thus able to enjoy consistent polling leads and personal popularity.

Mitchell also had some clear dividing lines between him and Labour. Firmly of the Friedmanomics persuasion, Mitchell and Shadow Chancellor Nick Herbert criticized the government for the state of the economy and public finances. The only way out of the recession was to stop wasteful spending. Spending reductions would be painful, but they were needed to maintain Britain’s economic stability and protect public finances for future generations.

Mitchell’s focus on usually unfriendly issues for the Conservatives including foreign aid contributions and environmental policies helped to boost Mitchell’s profile and made it easier for him to make the argument that he wasn’t your usual Tory.

Then 3/9 happened. What was left of the optimism of Jay/Hain era was shattered. Like with the assassination of Prince Charles, the response to 3/9 would make the Mitchell premiership, even before it started.

The Conservatives return to power was not greeted with a wave of optimism, but a sense of grim determination. Mitchell stood at the top of an untested Cabinet; with perhaps the most difficult in-tray any Prime Minister had received since the Second World War.

Mitchell, addressing the nation after accepting the Queen’s invitation to form a majority government, spoke of renewal, recovery, justice and hope. The Government, the country and its people had a mountain to climb, but it would be possible.

As expected, foreign affairs would dominate Mitchell’s term of office. As stringent anti-terrorism legislation was pushed through parliament, government attention was focused on the international “hot-zones” which housed and sponsored terrorist groups. Mitchell himself was far more comfortable in this area of politics and would become one of the loudest voices of the world stage in favour of interventionism. As such, he would work within NATO and the UN, authorising airstrikes against Afghanistan’s Taliban government and sending military and arms support to the Northern League.

Wanting an experienced hand in the Foreign Office, European Commissioner of External Relations was returned to Britain and the Lords to serve the government once again. As such Kenneth Clarke became Foreign Secretary and would be across the brief and the world, fighting fires where they emerged.

Mitchell would however find himself more focused on economics in his first term and would delegate such policies to the Foreign Office. Seeking to cut spending, and with the Florinzone economic and deficit spending rules converging, it became a political and economic credibility issue for the government to bring the deficit and debt down. Nick Herbert, who would serve as Chancellor throughout Mitchell’s premiership, became known as the “dictator at the tiller”.

The now infamous March 2010 budget saw Herbert implement one of the harshest budgets in recent memory. To boost government coffers’, income tax brackets were frozen, NICs raised, sin taxes on goods including alcohol, tobacco and fuel increased, a Graduate Tax created, and VAT rising to 22%. Serious cuts followed for almost all areas of spending, except for defence spending and foreign aid contributions. Even health spending was hit, with the inception of the NCS, allowing for a fudge of overall spending. Austerity had arrived.

Policies to boost aggregate supply were also instituted. With cuts to business taxes, the abolition of higher income tax brackets and a lowering of Capital Gains meant to supplement and promote private investment followed in further budgets. From Hain’s cuts to investment during his time in office, to weak government gilts (and low Florinzone confidence), public investment had dried up. As such, right-wing actors and think tanks made the argument that such policies, if unpopular, were a necessity to boost private investment. The argument which won over Mitchell, was that through such policies, Britain could become a centre for private investment with companies gaining market access to the highly regulated and highly taxed Florinzone.

As expected, such policies were massively unpopular, with the government suffering easily the worst approvals ratings of any government since the Second World War. As protests, riots and dramatic editorials hit the government, Mitchell would maintain course, speaking of the need for sacrifice and resilience.

Ironically, Mitchell would find significant support for his economic agenda on the Continent. Working closely with leaders of nations including Germany’s Rüttgers and later David McAllister, the Netherlands’ In 't Veld and Sweden’s Carl Bildt, Mitchell would manage the complicated web of European relations well and managed to win many arguments in Brussels on the direction of economic policy. It remained the case though, that even with these European allies, Florinzone monetary policy remained stagnant and mired by bureaucracy. Action on bank restructuring and recapitalization fell foul to the swathe of interest groups in Brussels.

As economic crisis hit the government, Mitchell would also be faced with a social and constitutional reckoning the like not seen before.

When Elizabeth Anania was elected President, she would usher in a new wave of feminism, and with it, made America take a hard long look at itself. With the rise of the eNet and websites such as LiveJournal, Encyclopædia Dramatica and MySpace, new communities of women and minorities would find safe spaces to speak openly. From forums, all the way to courthouses, women spoke up about abuse they faced from politicians, businessmen, Hollywood executives and world-famous actors.

One such abuser was Jeffrey Epstein, a pedophile who abused and exploited underage girls for himself and for his network of influential friends. Epstein’s arrest in June 2005 and the concurrent FBI investigation found an ever-growing ring of people who were at the very least aware of his crimes, or even contributors to the abuse themselves. As Bill Clinton, the Senator from Arkansas, was forced to resign on allegations he had flown on Epstein’s private plane (nicknamed the “Lolita Express”) and Alan Dershowitz was forced to stand down from the Supreme Court, a reckoning hit American shores.

Ghislaine Maxwell, the daughter of Lord Maxwell of Headington Hill would also be co-charged with Epstein’s crimes. She had introduced many of Britain’s elite to Epstein and soon the press followed the biggest lead to its inevitable conclusion.

Prince Andrew, the Duke of York, the heir apparent to the British throne ever since his older brother had been assassinated in 1994, had attended many of Epstein’s parties. He was close to both Epstein and Maxwell personally, having often vacationed to Epstein’s private island in the Caribbean, introduced the Queen to Epstein and spoke highly of the accused pedophile. That in of itself was bad enough.

When multiple accusers, then spoke up and said that Prince Andrew had sexually abused them, after being forced to do so by Epstein and Maxwell, it was a constitutional crisis not seen since 1936. Prince Andrew went to the ground, shutting himself away in Sandringham as the Royal Family went silent, cancelling almost all public appearances.

It was clear, to everyone that Andrew could not be a successor to the Queen, to everyone expect the Royal Family and Andrew himself. As protests grew and as MPs began calling for a “transitional” period away from the monarchy, it seemed as if an institution of British society was collapsing. Former Prime Minister Peter Hain, a republican, began to echo these views as did many other prominent voices including GLC leader John McDonnell and Scottish First Minister Tommy Sheppard.

Mitchell, bringing together the leaders of the Commonwealth realms which still had the Queen as head of state (such as Canada’s Mike Harris, New Zealand’s Bill English, and Australia’s Lindsay Tanner) an emergency summit was held in Canada House. Mitchell would then meet the Queen at Windsor to hammer out a solution. The Windsor Agreement, alongside making the royal family more accountable to both its people and the taxman, forced Prince Andrew to abdicate. However, the line of succession after Andrew would remain intact, meaning it would still fall to Andrew’s daughters’ Beatrice and Eugenie to take the throne. Andrew would accept nothing less, and by extension, neither would the Queen. This was met with derision, with Andrew undoubtedly keeping significant informal power and remaining at the heart of the Firm.

​

By this point, many assumed that Mitchell would go down in defeat. The economy was stagnant, the establishment and the institutions of British society in disrepute and the public deeply distrustful. But things would change after a conversation between President Daschle and Mitchell at former President Anania’s state funeral.

The terror networks which had caused 3/9, the spree of copy-cat attacks and the continuing humanitarian and political crisis in former Afghanistan and Pakistan had led to certain voices in the Daschle Administration to argue that a more forceful approach was necessary. Those who surrounded Daschle, such as Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and Defence Secretary James Woolsey, were leading figures in the burgeoning “interventionist” wing of the Democratic Party, which had abandoned the Republican Party with the Paul Presidency. Daschle agreed, horrified by the suffering in Afghanistan and Pakistan. Mitchell agreed wholeheartedly.

Afghanistan, still under Taliban rule, was in political, social and economic crisis. Pakistan, since the short and sharp Kashmir War in the late 1990s and the collapse of the government with the death of Zia-ul-Haq in 2000 and then the 2008 Karachi nuclear disaster, had become a hotbed for terrorist networks. Aid packages to the war-torn Pakistan often failed to reach the intended targets, and the nuclear clean-up efforts after the Karachi Disaster were stymied and blocked.

Daschle and Mitchell, working within NATO (the ever-belligerent Chinese government vetoed any attempt of UN approval) would gain support for troops on the ground in both nations. As protest movements swelled in America, fearing a second Venezuela, a NATO (but mostly) US and UK task force moved into Afghanistan and Pakistan.

Mitchell became a war leader, committing Britain to its first war since the Las Malvinas Crisis of 1982. Labour tied itself into knots on whether to back the intervention, with many of its Muslim MPs infuriated by the action, while Shadow Foreign Secretary Hilary Benn made a passionate speech in its favour in parliament. Shortly after British troops hit the ground in Afghanistan, Mitchell called a summer election.

In one of the dirtiest political campaigns in recent memory, Mitchell skewered Labour leader Huw Irranca-Davies for his soft left policies, attacked Labour’s economic policies and credibility and blamed Labour for the state the country had been left in, and was still in. Mitchell ran hard on the continuation of benefits and welfare reform, informing the campaign strategy. As part of the 2020 Conservative Central Office leak, it was discovered that campaign manager Lachlan Murdoch based the Conservative campaign around dog-whistle politics, attacking so-called “plebs” and “lefty loons” all the while painting Labour as the party of the strikers, protesters and whiners.

With austerity lighter than in 2010, voters also seemingly agreed with long-term strategy Conservative policy, with buzzwords such as deficit, spending and stability often polling in Mitchell’s favour.

Mitchell also leaned into some of the ever-present Euroskepticism, pledging a referendum lock on future changes. Mitchell was also helped by the UCP’s internal struggles and a so-called infiltration of the party by the so-called ‘far right’, which made the party even more unappealing to those moderates who were needed to pad Mitchell’s majority.

Polling day came and went, and the results were largely a re-run of 2009, with Mitchell securing a small majority, Labour far behind and the minor parties still without the balance of power.

Mitchell, now re-elected, began to focus on his area of expertise, foreign affairs. The intervention was dragging on, with elections scheduled in Afghanistan and re-runs in Pakistan. A highlight of Mitchell’s premiership was the 2014 COP summit in Belfast.

Mitchell and his environment secretary Chris Skidmore were razor-focused on finally agreeing a climate deal on a global scale. Supportive leaders, including America’s Daschle and with the Sovereign Union having elected the reformist and environmentalist Grigory Pasko, seemed to break the ice.

As such, and with the environment being one of Mitchell’s “progressive” policies, significant resources were placed to finally agree comprehensive global agreement and a successor to Buenos Aires Accords. Diplomats shuttled around Belfast, celebrities and environmentalists parachuted in to flex their popularity and knowledge, breakout talks going on into the A.M., it was a hard slog.

Yet, when David Cameron announced that an agreement had been reached, which committed almost every major nation to reduce emissions and agreed to do so to make sure the world didn’t heat past 1.5 °C, it was a legacy-defining achievement for Mitchell and a victory for the world.

Yet, despite this success on the world stage, British troops in Afghanistan and Northern Pakistan were trapped in a quagmire, with casualties mounting and terror networks seemingly emboldened by their actions and presence.

The assassination of the long-time leader of the Northern Alliance (and President of the Western-backed and democratic Afghanistan government) Ahmad Shah Massoud destabilised the nation and drained the Afghani government of any legitimacy of its own. Involvement in Pakistan went fro, humanitarian and anti-terror operations to a quasi-occupation as the perpetually unstable Islamabad government did little to welcome Western help. The so-called ‘occupation’ was detested by the Pakistani military and the radical Islamist groups who targeted Western troops and bases with particular vigour.

Domestically, the bite of Mitchell’s policies began to weigh down on his popularity, with austerity entering its 9th year and little of the stability created trickling down to those on lower incomes.

​

Some of the largest strike action since the SSABA, with public sector workers striking against the pay freezes and real term cuts. With ever popular front-line workers such as teachers, doctors and nurses on the picket line, public polling agreed with their cause. Such strikes exacerbated the crisis facing government services and seemed to lead to expensive contingency measures being introduced, which destroy the government’s arguments of economic credibility. Labour, swinging to the left after the Huw Irranca-Davies’ resignation, jumped to support front-line workers, doing surprisingly well in public polling.

Mitchell, gallivanting the globe, was similarly indifferent to domestic politics, and his Cabinet began to scheme. Soon the government was hit with a wave of minor ministerial resignations in the Spring of 2016, with many of those being ideological opponents of the liberal Mitchell and his brand of Conservatism. Even the signing of the Trans-Atlantic Trade Pact was met with disdain from certain Conservative backbenchers, who echoed many of Labour’s points and potential undercutting of British industries. Such disdain was unthinkable for a post-Heath party and represented a generational sea change for Tory MPs.

Such crisis led to more crisis for MPs, when the Expenses Scandal, long-simmering, exploded onto the scene in the Summer of 2016. It was revealed that hundreds of MPs, across the political divide, had their proverbial hands in the cookie jar. As MPs went to ground and figures such as Home Secretary Caroline Spelman, Cabinet Secretary David Laws and Defence Minister Tim Yeo were forced to resign because of the scandal, Mitchell found himself the unfortunate figurehead of a corrupt house of cards. As Labour and third parties (including Alan Sugar’s much vaunted “Centre Party”) surged in the polls, Mitchell’s Conservatives seemed on death’s door.

This discontent finally manifested in a confidence vote in the Autumn of 2016, which Mitchell won, but was far closer than perhaps he expected it to be.

Suddenly, it was clear to Mitchell. The ground he stood on was slippery, his policies unpopular and his own MPs conniving and sharpening their knives. Many of the MPs elected in 2009 and 2014 were of a new batch and had cut their teeth as activists during the divisive Currie and Fox years. Having been used to government, they did not fear opposition. They were outspoken, socially conservative, populist and euroskeptic. They became known as “Red Tories” and seemed to dominate debates and were responsible for the ever-growing intra-party divides.

The Economic Research Group (ERG), became infamous, pushing for the party to adopt populist economic policies and continually criticized Mitchell and Herbert. Their informal alliance with the UCP also seemed to point to the direction of travel for the party’s backbenches, with the hope of finally repairing the rift which began all the way back with Heath and Powell. The world also seemed to be shifting right, with hard-right leaders just elected in the US, France and Spain and Mitchell seemed an anachronism.

It was just after the Winter Recess when the Chairman of the 1922 Committee called the PM and informed him that his time was up. Mitchell could’ve fought it. But Mitchell was loathed to stoop to the level of his detractors and was eyeing up running for NATO Secretary-General anyway. And so, as the populist rose to take the crown, Mitchell swanned away from the Westminster stage, whistling a jaunty tune while doing so.

 

[CarlosTheAltHistoryGuy]

LiveJournal, Encyclopædia Dramatica and MySpace

I'm guessing that ITTL, Encyclopædia Dramatica isn't the troll site that is OTL, right?

 

[TGW]

I am slightly embarrassed by how, upon realizing I didn't recognize the name and seeking out information, I got genuinely excited when I learnt it was Mr Plebgate himself! Shocking to see him use it to his advantage here but thrilling nonetheless. The prevailing feeling of grimness (Enviromental issues not withstanding) really works out here and that last line really stuck in my head as I was reading it.