What if Michael Portillo kept his seat in 1997?

What if Michael Portillo did not lose his seat of Enfield Southgate in the 1997 UK election? he was considered a frontrunner for the party leadership, so if he kept his seat would Portillo become leader of the Tories? If so, how would he do? The Tories had just received the worst defeat in their history, but it's possible they make gains in the next election and then win back power in the election after that(or at least come very close), that's what they'd done after 1945. However insteaad after two more elections the party still hadn't gotten to 200 seats and so Tony Blair was never effectively challenged outside his party. Could Portillo have done better? I think he could. If he was leader Portillo could have been more willing get to modernise the party than Hague, and he may have begun to detoxify the Tory image. The result is the Tories gain seats in 2001, say getting around 190 and reducing Labour's majority. Portillo may stay on if he gets a good-enough result, but there are different standards of good-enough and what the Tories could plausibly get in 2001. If he says on I think he could reduce Blair to a hung Parliament in 2005 and maybe get the Tories back into government a few years earlier. How do you think a Portillo 1997 leadership would go? What would be the effects? Could the Conservatives get back into power earlier? How would British politics be altered? What if?
 

Quebec_Dave

Banned
What if Michael Portillo did not lose his seat of Enfield Southgate in the 1997 UK election? he was considered a frontrunner for the party leadership, so if he kept his seat would Portillo become leader of the Tories? If so, how would he do? The Tories had just received the worst defeat in their history, but it's possible they make gains in the next election and then win back power in the election after that(or at least come very close), that's what they'd done after 1945. However insteaad after two more elections the party still hadn't gotten to 200 seats and so Tony Blair was never effectively challenged outside his party. Could Portillo have done better? I think he could. If he was leader Portillo could have been more willing get to modernise the party than Hague, and he may have begun to detoxify the Tory image. The result is the Tories gain seats in 2001, say getting around 190 and reducing Labour's majority. Portillo may stay on if he gets a good-enough result, but there are different standards of good-enough and what the Tories could plausibly get in 2001. If he says on I think he could reduce Blair to a hung Parliament in 2005 and maybe get the Tories back into government a few years earlier. How do you think a Portillo 1997 leadership would go? What would be the effects? Could the Conservatives get back into power earlier? How would British politics be altered? What if?

I think Portillo will definitely do better than William Hague in the 2001 election. If he has a popularity boost, Blair could perhaps get spooked and let Parliament run its course until 2002. If Portillo can get the Tories up to 200 seats or even close to it, he'll lead the party to a hypothetical 2005/2006/2007 election and possibly win. The butterflies of a Conservative a Party with a seat count close to 200 could could butterflies with the Iraq War vote in Parliament. If Portillo detoxifies the Tories, that removes the whole reason for David Cameron to run for the leadership when he did.

Perhaps one of the people that ran for Parliament in 2001 but came up short could be leader and/or PM by now! What about Prime Minister Iain Dale? :)
 
2001 UK election
Tony Blair-Labour: 401-16 39.4%
Michael Portillo-Conservative: 187+22 33.7%
Charles Kennedy-LibDem: 43-3 17.7%
659 seats
330 for majority

This was the best plausible result I could come up with for Portillo in 2001. This is actually 1.2% more votes than the Tories got in 2005, when Labour was far weaker. However with a strong economy and New Labour still popular Blair still wins a landslide. Now what are the effects of this performance? Do the Tories thank Portillo for their gains and keep him on for another election? Or do they think it's not good enough because they don't have the hindsight of OTL and sack Portillo? Thoughts?
 

Quebec_Dave

Banned
2001 UK election
Tony Blair-Labour: 401-16 39.4%
Michael Portillo-Conservative: 187+22 33.7%
Charles Kennedy-LibDem: 43-3 17.7%
659 seats
330 for majority

This was the best plausible result I could come up with for Portillo in 2001. This is actually 1.2% more votes than the Tories got in 2005, when Labour was far weaker. However with a strong economy and New Labour still popular Blair still wins a landslide. Now what are the effects of this performance? Do the Tories thank Portillo for their gains and keep him on for another election? Or do they think it's not good enough because they don't have the hindsight of OTL and sack Portillo? Thoughts?

I think Portillo probably benefits from low expectations. In normal circumstances, 187 seats for either the Tories or Labour is grounds for a resignation from the election night podium but with the utter clusterfuck of 1997, the Tories would probably be forgiving.

Remember, Hague resigned but he only managed a net gain of 1 seat from the worst result since the Great Reform Act of 1832. There is no way he could survive that. He was a very talented politician to have survived politically to become Foreign Secretary in Cameron's first ministry.
 
I think Portillo probably benefits from low expectations. In normal circumstances, 187 seats for either the Tories or Labour is grounds for a resignation from the election night podium but with the utter clusterfuck of 1997, the Tories would probably be forgiving.

Remember, Hague resigned but he only managed a net gain of 1 seat from the worst result since the Great Reform Act of 1832. There is no way he could survive that. He was a very talented politician to have survived politically to become Foreign Secretary in Cameron's first ministry.

I guess Portillo could survive, after all Kinnock only gained 20 seats from a historically bad showing and he survived to fight another election.
 
So then Portillo stays on. Blair's second term goes as IOTL, Portillo's Tories vote for Iraq (he voted for Iraq IOTL). Portillo continues modernizing the Tories, and he focuses more on improving public services and avoids a 'core vote' strategy. The polls are too close for comfort, so Blair delays until 2006, but his position is weakened further by Iraq going worse and the 7/7 bombings. The 2006 election is held, with a strong Tory opposition as Labour is weak and begins tearing itself apart.

2006 UK election
Tony Blair-Labour: 312-89 33.6%
Michael Portillo-Conservative: 252+65 35.6%
Charles Kennedy-LibDem: 50+7 20.6%
646 seats
324 for majority

You could get a hung parliament in 2006/5 and perhaps if another election is held soon afterwards the Tories could gain the most seats. Thoughts? How would this scenario go?
 
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