WI: Roy Jenkins stays in Labour and becomes PM in the 1980s

The premise of this WI is quite simple: Roy Jenkins stays in Labour, becomes leader and then wins a general election in the early 1980s. How we achieve this through PoDs is up to you, but an idea I've seen in a TL before was that Labour wins in 1970, someone else (Callaghan? Castle?) leads the party to defeat in 1975, and Jenkins replaces them rather than going off to Europe.

What would a Jenkins-led Labour government want to do? Obviously, he would move the party to the centre which would upset the left, and he'd still be a Labour prime minister and I doubt he'd be able to drag the party to his views in a Blair-esque uncompromising way.

I've had a quick skim through the 1983 Alliance manifesto and it seems to focus heavily on industrial democracy and electoral reform. Would he actually be able to pass a form of electoral reform or would he be stymied by his backbenchers?
 
More of an idea on how we'd get to Prime Minister Jenkins than a Jenkins ministry, but if Wilson won in '70 and then resigned around '72/'73 as seems to be the general idea in such a situation, Peter Shore is the name I've seen floated around most of all. Most people seem to suggest he'd have been Wilson's preferred successor and, if he could gain the support of Foot, would win as the left-wing, Eurosceptic candidate over the likely candidature of James Callaghan. If they then lost in 1975 to the Conservatives (No idea who'd be leading them anymore, though I would hesitate to say it would be Enoch Powell for reasons of problematic electability i.e. IDS), Jenkins would be a veritable antidote as the social democratic, Europhile to Shore's leadership.

I would imagine a tough line on the trade unions though - nothing like Maggie, of course, but the social democrats in Labour never seemed to be big supporters of the trade unions, especially the more radically-led ones. On electoral reform, I wonder whether that would have more to do with the Alliance looking to gain more favour for itself as a small, new-ish party in the FPTP system.
 
Well this is good timing - I just today finished reading a Jenkins biography.

Jenkins winning the leadership ultimately relies on his standing among the PLP. This is probably at its peak in 1970-1972. After his rebellion on the EEC ascension vote, the decline is fairly rapid. Naturally this sets him against the anti-EEC side of the party - which by principle or pragmatism includes a lot of the Labour Right. The most fervently pro-EEC of the social democrats within the party also became disillusioned with him, as his Great Principled Stand in the first reading was followed by him voting along party lines in the second and third readings. After he rejoined the shadow cabinet, OTL Jenkins put party unity ahead of open confrontation from then until he left for Brussels in 1976. His disappointing result in the leadership election of that year pretty much draws the line under any leadership ambitions.

Opposition I don't see as being a good place for Jenkins to rise to the leadership. His strengths lay in effectiveness in office, not the in electioneering or party management essential for an opposition leader.

If Labour win 1970, and if Wilson leaves the leadership between 1970-1972, then Jenkins is presumably the favourite.

But, to address the OP:

Jenkins votes with his conscience all the way through to the final reading of the European Communities Act. The anti-EEC majority of the Labour Party dislike him for it, just as they did in OTL, but his own supporters remain more strongly supportive (people like Owen and Hattersley who later moved away from him, respectively in personal and political terms). The short term result is the same. Britain joins the EEC. Jenkins eventually rejoins the shadow cabinet ahead of the 1974 elections. Back in Government he is made Home Secretary, as in OTL. When Wilson retires, Jenkins stands for leader. Foot leads Callaghan in the first ballot, as OTL, but Jenkins performs more respectably, for a clear third place ahead of the 'also-rans'.

Now this is the awkward bit, because this could just as easily be a setup for PM Michael Foot - Healey is no more likely to drop out here than in OTL, and a continued split of the Right vote is a possibility. However, lets say that Crosland doesn't stand - having patched up his relationship with Jenkins at some point in the previous few years - and some sort of agreement is reached between them beforehand. In the second ballot Foot still leads, while Jenkins extends his lead over Healey, and Callaghan holds a narrow second place. At this point a deal is reached whereby both Healey and Jenkins drop out, allowing the Right to win the leadership under Callaghan.

Maybe Callaghan offers the Foreign Office to Jenkins as part of this deal - it being the last position Jenkins really coveted over that of EEC Commission Presidency. Maybe it goes to Crosland as it OTL, but Jenkins stays in Britain and in government nonetheless, only to be granted the position a year later when Crosland dies. 1976-1979 plays out much as OTL. Jenkins remaining in the Government might boost the prospects of the Lib-Lab pact - he had a good personal and working relationship with David Steel dating back to the 1960s - to the point that the Government lasts in office slightly longer. If and when it does end in the same way, Jenkins as Foreign Secretary is less tarnished by an essentially domestic economic crisis (an ironic reversal given his position as Chancellor in the run up to the 1970 election).

In opposition [allowing for what I've said above] Jenkins is now better placed for the leadership when Callaghan retires. Social democratic MPs have "somewhere else to go" that isn't Healey. If both men run it could go either way. Healey is probably better suited to Opposition than Jenkins, but Jenkins has the better CV as the holder of all three Great Offices of State. Both have issues with being seen as aloof; Jenkins more so than Healey, but Healey is famous as the political loner whereas Jenkins now has a faction of sorts, supporters of over a decade. Say Jenkins edges it in the first round, and beats the left's candidate in the second.

As to what happens next; Jenkins is Leader of the Opposition with no easy path back to power and a party far from united. The SDP evidently isn't happening - short of the leadership choosing to self-decapitate the Labour Party - but the left are going to be fractious. Under this scenario I see Jenkins as more likely to be a second Gaitskell - fight, fight and fighting again to change the party in opposition, but not winning an election in 1983/4. He may be helped in that he will remain by definition closer to the original Gang of Three - who saw the SDP as a social democratic Labour Mk.2 aiming to supplant the original, in contrast to Jenkins' ideal of a party of the radical centre drawing support away from both major parties. Here they'll be pulling in the same direction, as proto-modernisers of the Labour Party as it is. Eventually he hands over to one protege or other, who leads the party to victory in 1987. As to what Jenkins would be like as PM - I understand he saw himself as a Radical, an heir to Asquith as much as to Attlee. He'd look to govern as pragmatically as possible towards social democratic ends. As to his policies for the 1980s - statements he made while contesting the Warrington by-election may well be the best clue. This was before the SDP had settled on a formally agreed manifesto, and Jenkins ran more or less on his own personal platform.
 
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