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The Making of Modern Britain > Key Figures > Flashcards

Key Figures Flashcards

1
Q

Winston Churchill (1874-1965) p.2

A
  • Had been a cabinet minister in both Liberal and Conservative governments between 1906 and 1940
  • Became Prime Minister in the war Crisis of May 1940 and led Britain to victory by 1945
  • Continued to play role of world statesmen after the war even though the Conservatives were in opposition
  • Prime Minister again from 1951 to 1955 at the age of 77

BOOK:
CHURCHILL, EDEN, MACMILLAN AND HOME AS POLITICAL LEADERS
• Not really a great post-War prime minister - many serious ailments
• Thought of himself as an international statesman not a domestic politician
• Spent more time abroad meeting world leaders or relaxing at his favourite holiday spots than at Downing Street
• Believed that his key priority was to ensure that no new conflict would break out (dangers of nuclear war)
• Tried to persuade liberals to join his cabinet in the last 1950s
• His absenteeism often meant that the day-to-day government was left with the acting prime minister, Eden, and key ministers such as Rab Butler, the Chancellor

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2
Q

Anthony Eden (1897-1977) p.2

A
  • Talented politician who had always been thought of as a future Prime Minister
  • Rising political star in the 1930s and played a key role in WWII as Churchill’s Foreign Secretary
  • ‘Acting Prime Minister’ on several occasions during Churchill’s absence in 1951 to 1955
  • Became Prime Minister in 1955 but resigned in January 1957 after the Suez Crisis due to ill health

BOOK:
CHURCHILL, EDEN, MACMILLAN AND HOME AS POLITICAL LEADERS
• Increased Conservative majority from 17 to 60 when he called a general election in 1955
• More experienced with foreign policy, had little interest in domestic affairs
• Tried to move Macmillan from the Foreign Office to the Treasury in 1955, however Macmillan did not want to move and managed to delay it
• Made the decision to take military action in Suez in 1956 - soured his reputation as it ended in disaster
• Also caused massive splits in the party: 40 MPs rebelled and Heath (the one responsible for keeping the party in line) strongly opposed Eden’s actions
•Resigned in 1957 over ill health

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3
Q

R. A. Butler (1902-82) p.3

A
  • Became famous as the ‘best Prime Minister the Conservatives never had’
  • Came to prominence as architect of the 1944 Education Act and played a key role in the reorganisation of the party and its policies in preparation for returning to power in 1951
  • Chancellor from 1951 to 1955 and seen as possible leader of the party both in 1957 after the fall of Eden and again in 1963 when Macmillan resigned

BOOK:
CHURCHILL, EDEN, MACMILLAN AND HOME AS POLITICAL LEADERS
•Macmillan’s main rival in the campaign for PM
•Not as popular within the Conservative party as he was with the country
•Reputation was damaged by introducing tax cuts shortly before the 1955 election which had to be reversed as the economy overheated
•Closely linked to the policy of appeasement

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4
Q

Harold Macmillan (1894-1986) p.3

A
  • MP for Stockton-on-Tees and was Churchill’s military liaison officer during WWII
  • Housing Minister in Churchill’s government from 1951 and Foreign Secretary in the Eden government
  • ‘Emerged’ as new Conservative Prime Minister in 1957 after Eden’s resignation
  • His politics were shaped by two world wars and the Great Depression of the 1930s when he was MP for Stockton-on-Tees in the depressed northeast
  • Attlee said in 1951 that Macmillan had very nearly joined the Labour Party in the 1930s
  • One-nation Conservative (believes all classes in society have obligations to each other)

BOOK:
CHURCHILL, EDEN, MACMILLAN AND HOME AS POLITICAL LEADERS
• Preferred by most of Eden’s cabinet
• Had few enemies and was a safe choice
• Party unity was restored when he became PM in 1957
•Appeared to be in full control of affairs for the first five years
• Nicknamed ‘Supermac’ by 1959
• Led Conservatives to a comfortable victory in 1959, pushing their majority up to 100 seats
• Seemed to have the media in his hand: used new political opportunities provided by television with flair

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5
Q

Aneurin (‘Nye’) Bevan (1897-1960) p.7

A
  • Minster of health in the Attlee government and was the architect of the NHS
  • Hero to the Labour Left
  • When he resigned from the government in 1951 to protest against the introduction of prescription charges, he gained support of many Labour MPs and trade unionists

Book:
INTERNAL LABOUR DIVISIONS
• Key figure in the growing Labour Party split in the 1950s
• LEFT
• Stood for Labour Party leadership against Gaitskell in 1955
• Initially opposed Britain developing nuclear weapons but in 1957 he announced his opposition to unilateral nuclear disarmament

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6
Q

Hugh Gaitskell (1906-63) p.7

A
  • Chancellor of the Exchequer from 1950 to 1951 who introduced prescription charges
  • On the right of the Labour Party and became its leader in 1955, defeating Bevan in the election
  • Attempted to reform the Labour Party but was unsuccessful

Book:
INTERNAL LABOUR DIVISIONS
• Key figure in the Labour Party split in the 1950s
• Defeated Bevan in the run for Labour leadership in 1955 following Attlee stepping down
• RIGHT
• A confident and effective campaigner, promoting moderate policies that Labour thought would be popular with voters
• Labour defeat under Gaitskell was genuine surprise
• Put forward the idea of abolishing Clause IV (the clause that committed the party to nationalisation) at the 1959 conference
• Backed down without putting it to vote due to clear opposition from the left wing and some union leaders
• Tried to convince conference to reject unilateral nuclear disarmament in 1960 and lost - although he overturned this result a year later

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7
Q

Frank Cousins (1927-92) p.8

A
  • Became leader of the TGWU (Transport and General Workers’ Union) in 1956
  • Led an unsuccessful bus strike against the Macmillan government in 1958
  • In the Labour Party conference of October 1960, Cousins bitterly opposed Gaitskell’s leadership of the Labour movement, specifically over nuclear weapons
  • Led the unions into taking left-wing positions hostile to the party leadership.
  • Divisions carried on into the 1970s and 80s

BOOK:
INTERNAL LABOUR DIVISIONS
• Led fierce opposition to Gaitskell over Britain’s nuclear weapons after becoming leader of the TGWU, one of the most powerful unions

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8
Q

Sir Alec Douglas-Home (Lord Home) (1903-95) p.10

A
  • Served as Foreign Secretary under both Macmillan and Heath (1970-74)
  • When he was chosen to be the Conservative Party leader in 1963, he gave up his peerage so that he could sit in the House of Commons rather than the House of Lords
  • Introduced elections for the Conservative leadership, as a formal system hadn’t existed before 1965

BOOK:
REASONS FOR THE CONSERVATIVES’ FALL FROM POWER
• A peer who became leader of the Conservative party after there was strong opposition to the two most obvious candidates, Rab Butler and Lord Hailsham
• Made Conservative Party seem trapped in a bygone age

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9
Q

Peter Thorneycroft (1909-94) p.15

A
  • Conservative MP from 1938
  • Resigned as Chancellor of the Exchequer in 1958 but returned to the cabinet in 1960
  • Great supporter of Thatcher and served as chairman of the Conservative Party from 1975 to 1981

BOOK:
BALANCE OF PAYMENTS ISSUES AND ‘STOP-GO’ POLICIES
• Believed in ‘monetarism’ (wanted to limit wage increased and cut the money supply) during the run on the pound after Britain’s financial weakness was exposed by the US over the Suez Crisis

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10
Q

Enoch Powell (1912-98) p.15

A
  • Conservative MP from 1950 to 1970
  • Held a number of ministerial posts but was a critic of the post-war consensus
  • Became notorious for a speech he made about immigration in 1968 after which he was sacked from the shadow cabinet
  • Left Conservative Party in 1974, instead urging people to vote for Labour in the March election because he was opposed to entry into the EEC
  • Elected as an MP for the Ulster Unionist Party in October 1974

BOOK:
BALANCE OF PAYMENTS ISSUES AND ‘STOP-GO’ POLICIES
• Resigned along with Thorneycroft and Nigel Birch after Macmillan overruled Thorneycroft’s drastic spending cuts in 1958

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11
Q

Oswald Mosley (1896-1980) p.25

A
  • Conservative MP from 1918 but joined the Labour Party in the 1920s
  • Dissatisfied with Labour government’s respond to the Great Depression in the early 1930s, he set up the New Party, which later became the British Union of Fascists
  • Interned during the war but in 1948 set up the Union Movement

BOOK:
ATTITUDES TO IMMIGRATION AND RACIAL VIOLENCE
• Leader of British fascism, tried to use the issue of immigration and riots (Notting Hill riots) to stand as the Union Movement candidate in 1959, on a platform of repatriation

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12
Q

Charles de Gaulle (1894-1970) p.31

A
  • Leader of the Free French Forces who fought on after French surrendered in 1940
  • Had many rows with his main allies, Churchill and Roosevelt, and remained suspicious of ‘les Anglo-Saxons’, especially the Americans, in his later career
  • Led France through the transition from dictatorship to democracy after the liberation of France in 1944
  • Retired in 1946 but returned as president in 1959, remaining in that position until 1969

BOOK:
EFTA AND ATTEMPTS TO JOIN THE EEC
• Last-minute vetoed Britain’s application to the EEC in 1963
• Refused to continue negotiations
• Intervention caused bad relations between Britain and France for some time

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13
Q

Edward Heath (1916-2005) p.31

A
  • Conservative MP for Bexley, Kent from 1950 to 2001
  • Served as Chief Whip under Eden and shadow Chancellor under Douglas-Home before becoming leader of the Conservative Party from 1965 to 1975
  • Prime Minister from 1970 to 1974 but lost the party leadership to Margaret Thatcher in 1975 and was openly critical of her policies
  • Pro-European and oversaw the entry of Britain into the EEC in 1973

BOOK:
EFTA AND ATTEMPTS TO JOIN THE EEC
• As Macmillan’s chief negotiator, he lead many months of hard bargaining to be able to join the EEC despite being unable to conform to some of it’s rules (e.g. Britain received lamb exports from New Zealand, which was blocked by EEC rules due to their Common Agricultural Policy)

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14
Q

Colonel Gamel Abd al-Nasser (1918-70) p.34

A
  • One of the leaders of a nationalist revolt for independence against the old Egyptian monarchy
  • Became Egypt’s president in 1956, remaining in that position until his death in 1970
  • Neutral in the Cold War which concerned Britain and the US

BOOK:
SUEZ, 1956
• Brought about Egyptian independence and announced the nationalisation of the Suez Canal Company to provide finance for the Aswan Dam (which the US and GB had previously planned to invest in but later pulled out)

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15
Q

Harold Wilson (1916-95) p.40

A
  • Labour MP from 1945 to 1983
  • Leader of the party from 1963 to 1976 and Prime Minister from 1964 to 1970 and 1974 to 1976, winning four general elections
  • Cultivated a personal image as a great moderniser and being down to earth

BOOK:
WILSON AND THE LABOUR GOVERNMENTS
• Labour seemed to be more in touch with the social and cultural trends of the 1960s upon Wilson’s arrival to Downing Street in 1964
• Promised Britain would catch up with the ‘white heat’ of technological change
• Good political tactician and portrayed an attractive image to the voters, unlike Heath who was stiff and lacked personality

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16
Q

James Callaghan (1912-2005) p.41

A
  • Entered Parliament as MP for Cardiff in 1945
  • Wilson appointed him Chancellor in 1964 and later served as both Foreign Secretary and Home Secretary, becoming one of the few men to have held the three top cabinet posts
  • Associated with the centre-right of the party but with excellent links to the trade unions, Callaghan succeeded Wilson as Prime Minister in 1976

BOOK:
ECONOMIC POLICIES AND PROBLEMS INCLUDING DEVALUATION
• During the 1960s, Labour inherited a deficit it about £800 million, however Wilson and Callaghan did not want to use the classic solutions of deflation or devaluation
• They were determined to break away from the old deflation ‘stop-go’ approach, and devaluation would make Britain look and be weaker as it would have to scale back its worldwide activities
• Labour had also devalued the pound in 1949 under Attlee - didn’t want reputation

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17
Q

George Brown (1914-85) p.42

A
  • Came from a working-class trade unionist background and was on the right of the Labour Party
  • Had a number of shadow cabinet and cabinet roles and was deputy leader of the Labour Party between 1960 and 1970
  • Defeated by Wilson in the leadership elections of 1963
  • Regarded by many people as unpredictable, as he had a serious alcohol problem and frequently clashed with his cabinet colleagues
  • Resigned in 1968 after a row with Wilson

BOOK:
ECONOMIC POLICIES AND PROBLEMS INCLUDING DEVALUATION
• Led the Department of Economic Affairs (DEA) after it was set up by Wilson in an attempt to solve the huge deficit in the 1960s
• Aim was to secure the monetary restraint needed to prevent inflation rising - which would have had to be controlled by the government
• Attempt to avoid stop-go cycle of 50s
• Ultimately, Brown’s economic proposals (such as growth targets and voluntary agreement about wages and prices with workers) came to nothing

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18
Q

Roy Jenkins (1920-2003) p.43

A
  • Son of a Welsh miner who had entered Parliament as a Labour MP in 1950
  • Under the premiership of Harold Wilson, he served as Home Secretary from 1965 to 1967 and Chancellor of the Exchequer from 1967 to the 1970
  • Strong pro-European and considered to be on the right of the Labour Party
  • Founded and led the Social Democratic Party (SDP) in 1981

BOOK:
ECONOMIC POLICIES AND PROBLEMS INCLUDING DEVALUATION
• Replaced Callaghan as Chancellor
• Used deflationary methods to markedly improve economic situation (gave top priority to improving balance of payments)
• Achieved balance of payments surplus by 1969, although inflation was still at 12% in 1970
• This economic improvement was key in making Labour confident of victory in 1970

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19
Q

Barbara Castle (1910-2002) p.44

A
  • Labour MP for Blackburn from 1945 to 1979
  • Held a number of cabinet posts, introducing the breathalyser when minister for transport and putting through the Equal Pay Act as Secretary of State for employment
  • On the left of the party and was seen as a Bevanite
  • Labour MEP between 1979 and 1989

BOOK:
INDUSTRIAL RELATIONS AND TRADE UNIONS
• Castle and Wilson started using the ‘Fair Deal at Work’ policy to limit wildcat strikes (unofficial strikes where the activists would not take orders from the top) which had been on the rise in 1966 and 1967, when industrial relations with the trade unions began to deteriorate
• Believed strongly in a powerful trade union but also believed in the need for it to act responsibly
• Published her white paper, In Place of Strife, in 1969 in which it was suggested that:
- there was to be a 28-day ‘cooling off’ period before a strike went ahead
- the government could impose a settlement when unions were in dispute with each other
- strike ballots could be imposed
- an industrial relations court would be able to prosecute people who broke the rules
• Her proposals were supported by many Labour MPs such as Jenkins, however the unions and left of the Labour Party hated them

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19
Q

Jack Jones (1913-2009) p.44

A
  • Worked as a docker
  • Joined the International Brigade to fight fascism in the Spanish Civil War in the 1930s
  • Important in defeating In Place of Strife in 1969 and important in the setting up of Wilson’s Social Contract in the 1970s
  • In 1977 54% of the population thought he was the most powerful man in Britain
  • Became a campaigner for pensioners’ rights after retiring in 1978

BOOK:
INDUSTRIAL RELATIONS AND TRADE UNIONS
• A powerful union leader that strongly protested against the proposals in Castle’s In Place of Strife
• Protests were supported by Callaghan, the Home Secretary, and at least 50 Labour MPs who were ready to rebel

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21
Q

Tony Benn (1925-2014) p.44

A
  • Became an MP at 25
  • Fought to remain an MP and did not take the peerage (noble rank) after his father, Viscount Stansgate, died
  • Held a number of cabinet posts in the 1960s and 1970s but by the end of the 70s had moved to the left of the Labour Party
  • Followers known as Bennites
  • Stood for deputy leadership in 1981, only narrowly losing by 1%

BOOK:
OTHER DOMESTIC POLICIES
• When Benn took over as minister of technology from Cousins in 1966, the department of technology performed better
• Previously, Jenkins, minister of aviation, had admitted that he had difficulty understanding his briefings because of his non-scientific mind, and Cousins had little interest in technological development
• Wilson wanted to emphasise technology and science (White heat) and so Benn’s entry as minister of technology was a boost for the government in the form of actual expertise

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22
Q

David Steel (b. 1938) p.51

A
  • Entered Commons as a Liberal in 1965 having won a by-election
  • Youngest MP in that parliament and he continued to serve until 1997, becoming Liberal Leader in 1976
  • Key interest was in domestic affairs and social policy, and he was the party’s employment spokesman from 1965 to 1967, before becoming Chief Whip in 1970

BOOK:
THE LEGALISATION OF ABORTION
• Led the abortion reform campaign in parliament after the thalidomide disaster of 1959 to 1962, supported by the Labour government and also a number of Conservatives
• Jenkins ensured an all-night Commons sitting in order to pass the bill
• Resulted in Abortion Act 1967

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23
Q

Tony Crosland (1918-77) p.53

A
  • First elected as Labour MP in 1959 but lost his seat in 1955 before winning the seat of Grimsby in 1959
  • Wrote The Future of Socialism between 1955 and 1959, it was a hugely influential book on the right wing of the Labour Party
  • Later served as Foreign Secretary from 1976 to 1977

BOOK:
EDUCATIONAL REFORM
• Became minister of education in 1965 as a leading supporter of the comprehensive system
• By 1964, 1 in 10 pupils was being educated in a comprehensive (10 times as many as in 1951), Crosland accelerated this process after becoming minister
• Issued Circular 10/65, requesting Local Eduction Authorities to convert to comprehensive schools
• Many authorities responded after 1966 when the government made money for new school buildings conditional on the drawing up of plans for comprehensives

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24
Q

Jennie Lee (1904-88) p.55

A
  • Came from a working-class family and had only been able to attend Edinburgh University with support from a trust which agreed to pay half her fees
  • During the General Strike of 1926 she gave some of her bursary money to her family, as her union-activist father lost his job
  • First elected to Parliament in 1929, and in 1964 was appointed arts minister
  • Retired in 1970 and was created Baroness Lee of Asheridge

BOOK:
THE OPEN UNIVERSITY
• Appointed by Wilson in 1964 to consider the ‘University of the Air’ project (education via television and radio)
• It was her commitment that saw the project through

25
Q

Hugh Greene (1910-87) p.58

A
  • Director-General of the BBC from 1960 to 1969
  • Introduced new programming such as satire, realistic drama such as Z Cars (1962-78), unconventional sitcoms such as Steptoe and Son (1962-74) as well as the often controversial The Wednesday Play (1964-70), which dealt with with like mental breakdown, alcoholism and homelessness
    Some plays also contained nudity and ‘offensive language’

BOOK:
THE EXPANSION OF THE MASS MEDIA
• Set out to transform the BBC when he became Director-General in 1960
• Money was diverted from radio to television guidelines on nudity and swearing were revised, a new style of news presentation and more popular programmes were commissioned
• By 1961, 75% of the population had a TV in their home and by 1971 it was 91% percent

26
Q

Mary Whitehouse (1910-2001) p.63

A
  • Birmingham housewife
  • Began her own ‘moral crusade’ in 1963 against what she saw as a ‘tide or immorality and indecency’ in Britain at the time. Her crusade was particularly directed at the Director-General of the BBC, Sir Hugh Greene
  • Gained a lot of public support when she launched her ‘Clean Up TV’ campaign in 1964
  • Founded the National Viewers’ and Listeners’ Association in 1965
  • Campaign continued until the 1980s

BOOK:
CHANGES IN MORAL ATTITUDES AND THE ‘PERMISSIVE SOCIETY’
• Whitehouse was concerned by the changes in media, in which permissive ideas were being spread (taboo subjects were being discussed in books, on the radio and on television)
• The support and publicity she received led to the setting up of the National Viewers’ and Listeners’ Association in 1965, which soon had 100,000 members
• Despite her lobbying, Whitehouse failed to have any impact on the programmes shown

27
Q

Michael Foot (1913-2010) p.68

A
  • A popular and respected left-winger and a great admirer of Bevan
  • A talented journalist with a regular column in the Daily Herald
  • His first experience of being in the government was as Wilson’s minister of employment in 1974
  • On the left wing of the Labour Party, strongly supported CND and was fervently opposed to Britain joining the EEC
  • Became leader of the Labour Party in 1980 after Labour’s defeat in 1979

BOOK:
FOREIGN AFFAIRS
• Wrote a denunciation of Wilson’s government in June 1966 which appeared on the front page of the left-wing magazine Tribune:

WHAT’S WRONG WITH OUR GOVERNMENT?
“The short answer is plenty. No glimmer of a changed strategy, an enlarged vision, since the election. Pathetic acceptance of the Tory legacy in defence and foreign policy. We and our Labour government share the guilt for the continuance of the infamy of Vietnam.”

28
Q

Denis Healey (1917-2015) p.71

A
  • A Labour MP from 1952 until his retirement in 1992
  • Minister of defence between 1964 and 1970 and Chancellor of the Exchequer between 1974 and 1979
  • On the right wing on the party and was deputy leader of the party between 1980 and 1983
BOOK:
DECOLONISATION INCLUDING ('WITHDRAWAL FROM EAST OF SUEZ') AND RHODESIA
• Started a process in 1964 of spending cuts designed to bring the defence budget below £2 billion by 1970 - the government knew that there would have to be a reduction in Britain's military commitments for economic reasons
• His defence white paper in 1967 set a timetable for troop withdrawals from Aden, the Middle East, Malaysia and Singapore
29
Q

Ian Smith (1919-2007) p.72

A
  • First Prime Minister of Rhodesia to be born there rather than in Britain
  • Had been a farmer before entering politics
  • Remained Prime Minister until the Lancaster Agreement of 1979 when Rhodesia, now named Zimbabwe, had its independence officially recognised

BOOK:
DECOLONISATION INCLUDING ‘WITHDRAWAL FROM EAST OF SUEZ’ AND (RHODESIA)
• Political row blew up when he became PM of Rhodesia
• Issued a Unilateral Declaration of Independence for Rhodesia without accepting majority rule
• UDI was seen as a direct challenge to Labour government (under Wilson)
• Met with Wilson for face-to-face talks in December 1966 and they seemed to make progress but Smith disavowed everything he had said when he got home
• Smith felt as though he could rely on support from the right of the Conservative party and all he had to do was wait for Britain to give up trying to negotiate (Wilson had tried to place oil sanctions but they didn’t work as Rhodesia could easily get supplies through the Portuguese colony of Mozambique, and big oil companies often ignored the sanctions policy)
• Made Britain look weak as Wilson’s diplomacy didn’t work

30
Q

Keith Joseph (1918-94) p.76

A
  • Conservative MP for Leeds North East from 1956 to 1987 and held posts in the cabinets of four prime ministers between 1961 and 1986
  • Deep thinker on economic policy with strong views on the need for free-market policies
  • Supported Thatcher in the leadership campaign in 1975 and had a great deal of influence on her early policy decisions

BOOK:
HEATH AS LEADER
• Along with Enoch Powell, Joseph put forward monetarist and free-market policies that were supported and listened to by Thatcher

31
Q

Margaret Thatcher (1925-2013) p.76

A
  • Became MP for Finchley in 1959
  • Gained her first cabinet post in 1970 as education secretary in Heath’s government
  • Emerged as the surprise candidate challenging Heath for the party leadership in 1975
  • Became PM after the 1979 general election and dominated British politics for the next 11 years

BOOK:
HEATH AS LEADER
• Emerged as Heath’s key challenger after several backbench MPs were determined to force a leadership contest after the election defeats of 1974
• Her policies were generally to the right of Heath and Macmillan
• Became sympathetic to monetarist and free-market policies put forward by Enoch Powell and Keith Joseph
• Defeated Heath in the leadership election in 1975 and Heath’s reputation took a battering from supporters of Thatcherism who rejected much of his legacy

32
Q

Arthur Scargill (b. 1938) p.78

A
  • Played a big part in the successful strikes of 1972 and 1974 as the leader of the Yorkshire miners
  • Succeeded the moderate Joe Gormley as president of the National Union of Miners and in 1981 and led them in the unsuccessful strike of 1984 to 1985
  • Founded a new party to promote ‘real socialism’ in 1993 but made little impact

BOOK:
INDUSTRIAL RELATIONS AND THE MINERS’ STRIKES
• The miners’ strike, led by Scargill, started on 9th January 1972 at a time of harsh winter weather
• Use of flying pickets virtually stopped the movement of coal around the country
• By 9th February the government declared a State of Emergency as schools were closed and 1.2 million workers were laid off
• Three-day week was announced to save electricity
• NUM leader Gormley was able to negotiate a generous wage settlement with the Wilberforce Committee (set up by the government to examine the miners’ demands)

33
Q

Willie Whitelaw (1918-99) p.78

A
  • Old-style upper-class Conservative with centrist ideas similar to those of Macmillan
  • Highly effective negotiator in the Northern Irish Sunningdale negotiations
  • Moved to the Department of Employment in 1973 in an attempt to get a compromise solution to the miners’ strike
  • Became a loyal deputy PM to Thatcher in the 80s

BOOK:
INDUSTRIAL RELATIONS AND THE MINERS’ STRIKES
• Moved by Heath from the Northern Ireland Office to be minister of employment as he was considered a skilled negotiator but this failed
• Miners refused to accept to pay offer and the government refused to treat the miners as a special case

34
Q

Martin McGuinness (1950-2017) p.81

A
  • Member of the Provisional IRA in the early 1970s, although he claims to have left the organisation in 1974
  • Elected as an MP for Sinn Fein in 1997 (although like all Sinn Fein members he did not take his seat)
  • Sinn Fein’s chief negotiator at the talks that led to the Good Friday Agreement in 1998
  • Later became deputy first minister in the devolved Northern Irish Assembly after 2007

BOOK:
THE TROUBLES IN NORTHERN IRELAND, INCLUDING THE SUNNINGDALE AGREEMENT
• Interviewed in the early 90s for a book about Irish Republicans during the Troubles:

“The decision was taken that Republicans would attend the march and there would be no aggro whatsoever. It was important to have thousands of people marching in the street against internment as opposed to us trying to take advantage. We all went to the March and we ended up in the Bogside with all the paratroopers shooting people dead. I saw people being killed all around me but there was nothing I could do. I was absolutely raging.”

35
Q

Ian Paisley (1926-2014) p.82

A
  • Led the loyalist opposition to the Catholic civil rights movement in the 1960s and was involved in setting up parliamentary loyalist organisations
  • An evangelical Protestant, establishing the Free and Presbyterian Church of Ulster in 1951 and was outspoken in his criticism of Catholics, famously denouncing the Pope as the Antichrist
  • MP from 1970 to 2010 and and MEP from 1979 to 2004
  • The DUP was fiercely opposed to any form of power sharing or compromise throughout the Troubles and was initially opposed to the Good Friday Agreement of 1998, although Paisley eventually served as first monster of Northern Ireland from 2007 to 2008 under its terms

BOOK:
THE TROUBLES IN NORTHERN IRELAND, INCLUDING THE SUNNINGDALE AGREEMENT
• Reverend Paisley formed the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP) in 1971 along with other unionists disillusioned with moderate unionists in the Ulster Unionist Party (UUP)
• Remained DUP leader until 2008

36
Q

John Hume (b. 1937) p.82

A
  • Involved in the Irish civil rights movement of the 1960s
  • Co-founded the Social Democratic Labour Party (SDLP) and became its leader in 1979
  • Instrumental in working with Sinn Fein to bring about the IRA ceasefires in the 1990s and in bringing Sinn Fein and the British government together for talks
  • Won the Nobel Peace Prize (joint with David Trimble) in 1998 for his role in the Good Friday Agreement

BOOK:
THE TROUBLES IN NORTHERN IRELAND, INCLUDING THE SUNNINGDALE AGREEMENT
• A nationalist who formed the Social Democratic Labour Party (SDLP) in 1970 to fight for civil rights for Catholics and a united Ireland but rejected violent methods

37
Q

Teddy Goldsmith (1928-2009) p.99

A
  • Heir of a wealthy family
  • Travelled across the world to learn about tribal peoples and campaigned against the destruction of the Amazon rainforest in the late 1960s
  • Set up the journal The Ecologist in 1970 to publicise environmental issues
  • His brother, James Goldsmith, later set up the anti-European Referendum Party in the 1990s

BOOK:
ENVIRONMENTALISM
• Published A Blueprint for Survival in 1972 which advocated a return to self-sufficiency and a de-industrialised society
• His book formed the political platform of The People’s Party (now known as the Green Party) which was set up in 1973
• The People’s Party put up 5 candidates in February 1974, including Goldsmith
• The party changed its name to the Ecology Party in 1975 and put up 53 candidates in the 1979 general election
• By the end of the 70s, environmentalism had carved a permanent place on the political scene thanks to Goldsmith

38
Q

Mao Zedong (1893-1976) p.105

A
  • Led China from the communist revolution until his death
  • By the late 1960s there was growing friction between China and the Soviet Union which led Mao to look for a rapprochement with the United States

BOOK:
ATTITUDES TO THE USSR AND CHINA
• In February 1972, President Nixon visited China and held meetings with the Chinese leader Mao after he surprisingly announced a thawing of relations in 1971
• Previously, relations between China, Britain, the United Stars and Western Europe were strained
• Britain followed suit in March, agreeing an exchange of ambassadors with China
• Heath made many visits to China from 1974 onwards, and was awarded the ‘People’s Friendship Envoy’; the highest possible honour given by the Chinese government to a foreigner

39
Q

Norman Tebbit (b. 1931) p.108

A
  • An outspoken Essex MP who was appointed Trade Secretary in Thatcher’s first cabinet and later became party chairman
  • His down-to-earth, abrasive style made him very popular with the new Thatcherites though not their opponents
  • Michael Foot described him as ‘a semi-house-trained polecat’
  • Left the government in 1987, though he remained loyal to Thatcherite ideals

BOOK:
THATCHER AS LEADER: CHARACTER AND IDEOLOGY
• Believed there had been a moral decline linked to the consensus
• Said ‘the trigger of today’s outburst in crime and violence lies in the era and attitudes of post-war funk which gave birth to the “Permissive Society” which in turn generated today’s violent society’ in a lecture to the Disraeli Society on 1985

40
Q

Sir Geoffrey Howe (1926-2015) p.109

A
  • Served as trade minister in Heath’s government until 1974 and was Thatcher’s first Chancellor of the Exchequer from 1979 to 1983
  • Presided over the application of monetarist principles to economic policies
  • From 1983 to 1989, he was foreign minister but his views on Europe came into conflict with Thacher’s
  • His resignation speech in 1990 helped to cause her fall from power

BOOK:
MINISTERS: SUPPORT AND OPPOSITION
• Seen as ‘dry’ (someone who was firm and uncompromising in their support for monetarism) by Thatcher
• Appointed as Chancellor by Thatcher as she saw him as ‘one of them’
• Thatcherite

41
Q

Nigel Lawson (b. 1932) p.109

A
  • Served in Thatcher’s first term as Howe’s number two at the Treasury and replaced Howe as Chancellor in 1983
  • His expansionary budgets of the 1987 and 1988 created the ‘Lawson boom’
  • Resigned from the government in 1989, furious about the excessive influence wielded by Thatcher’s private economic adviser, Professor Alan Walters

BOOK:
MINISTERS: SUPPORT AND OPPOSITION
• Had a ‘dry’ approach to economy and finance
• Given a key economic post along with another dry, John Biffen, by Thatcher

42
Q

Michael Heseltine (b. 1933) p.110

A
  • A millionaire who became a leading Conservative politician in the 1980s
  • Nicknamed ‘Tarzan’ as a result of his long hair and flamboyant style
  • His ‘One Nation’ (wet) and pro-European views brought him into conflict with Thatcher and he resigned from her cabinet in 1986 over the Westland Affair
  • Many Thatcherites blamed him for the fall of Thatcher in 1990
  • Later deputy PM to John Major

BOOK:
MINISTERS: SUPPORT AND OPPOSITION
• The most serious challenge to Thatcher’s authority was the Westland Affair, in which Heseltine stormed out of a cabinet meeting, resigning his position and claiming that Thatcher was acting unconstitutionally
• Thatcher survived Westland, and Heseltine became a focus of discontent for those Conservative MPs who were unhappy with Thatcher’s rule

43
Q

Neil Kinnock (b. 1942) p.111

A
  • Left-wing Labour MP from South Wales
  • Succeeded Michael Foot as Party leader in 1983
  • Changed his mind of key left-wing causes such as unilateralism, nationalisation and withdrawal from the EEC
  • Strongly attacked the hard Left and set out to move the Labour Party back towards the political middle ground
  • Started the process of modernising the party organisations and improving party discipline
  • Led Labour to two election defeats in 1987 and 1992 but did much to restore Labour’s political credibility

BOOK:
DIVIDED OPPOSITION, 1979-87: LABOUR AND THE FORMATION OF THE SDP
• When Kinnock replaced Foot as Labour leader in 1983, Labour was in danger of being marginalised by Thatcherism and by the rise of the SDP
• Played a big part in dragging Labour back into the political mainstream
• Took on/condemned the extremists Militant Tendency (Trotskyite revolutionary socialism: ‘better to break the law than break the poor’), the ‘Bennites’, and the union leaders
• Criticised Arthur Scargill for failing to hold a strike ballot during the miners’ strike of 1984
• In 1986, he was successful in expelling Militant Tendency from the Labour Party but it was still perceived as dominated by the Left and the trade unions

44
Q

Bobby Sands (1954-81) p.114

A
  • Joined the IRA as a teenager in 1972
  • Said he joined the IRA because of his experiences growing up in Belfast: his family moved three times as Protestants used violence and intimidation to force Catholics out of their houses, and he was forced by gunmen to leave his job
  • Arrested in 1972 for possession of firearms
  • After his release in 1976 he was involved in the bombing of a furniture showroom and sentenced to 14 years in prison
  • While in prison he wrote poetry and articles about the IRA prisoners
  • His death, at the age of 27, made him a martyr for the republican movement

BOOK:
NORTHERN IRELAND AND THE TROUBLES
• Led hunger strikes in 1980 as a protest for Special Category Status for IRA prisoners held in H-Block of the Maze prison in Belfast; they wanted to be recognised as political prisoners rather than criminals
• Strikers gained a lot of attention and support
• Still on hunger strike, Sands was nominated to stand in the by-election as the Anti-H-Block candidate and he won the seat, however a few weeks later he died
• Became a republican hero
• Nine more hunger strikers died before the protests were called off in October 1981

45
Q

Gerry Adams (b. 1948) p.115

A
  • Became leader of Sinn Fein, the political wing of the IRA, in 1981
  • Elected MP for West Belfast in 1983 but refused to attend the ‘English parliament’ because this would entail swearing an oath of allegiance to the queen
  • One of the architects of Sinn Fein’s twin-track strategy, using the ‘arms lite and the ballot box’
  • Played a leading role in the IRA cease fires and the peace process that led to the Good Friday Agreement

BOOK:
NORTHERN IRELAND AND THE TROUBLES
• The electoral success in Fermanagh and South Tyrone meant that Adams and other republicans began to see that there were advantages to using the ‘ballot box and the gun’* as a twin-track strategy and Sinn Fein became more focused on winning parliamentary seats

*elections in Ireland were contested by Sinn Fein, while the IRA continued to pursue an armed struggle against the British Army, the Royal Ulster Constabulary, and loyalist parliamentary groups

46
Q

Ken Livingstone (b. 1945) p.119

A
  • Made his name as a left-wing activist in Lambeth Borough Council
  • Became leader of the Greater London Council in 1981 and remained leader until it was abolished in 1986
  • First elected Mayor of London from 2001 to 2008
  • Regarded as an unreliable maverick by the Labour Party leadership, who tried to block his election in 2001
  • Allowed to rejoin the party in 2005 after he proved popular and successful

BOOK:
THATCHER’S ECONOMIC POLICIES AND THEIR IMPACT (MONETARISM)
• Headed one of the fiercest battles between the Conservative government and the Labour left-wing as leader of the GLC (clashes came as a result of the Conservatives cutting public spending)
• Thatcher government saw left-wing local councils as enemies, both in terms of their ideology and because they blamed them for wasting resources
• Thatcher treated many GLC policies in education and public transport as provocations
• Livingstone was demonised as the face of the ‘loony left’ (name given by right-wing press to left-wing local councils that promoted liberal and politically correct policies)

47
Q

Edwina Currie (b. 1946) p.127

A
  • Elected as a Conservative MP for Derbyshire South in 1986
  • Strong supporter of Thatcher and served as junior health minister between 1986 and 1988
  • Famous for making controversial statements and had to resign her ministerial post after claiming that most egg production was affected with salmonella, however it was later shown that she was right
  • Lost her seat at the 1997 election

BOOK:
THE IMPACT ON THATCHERISM ON SOCIETY
• Commented on how the lives of her constituents had changed for the better in her autobiography in 1989

48
Q

Rupert Murdoch (b. 1931) p.128

A
  • Already famous before the rise of Sky Satellite television in the 1990s
  • Made a fortune in Australian and American newspapers when he started to build up his British newspaper empire in the 1980s
  • He took over The Sun and made it th fastest-selling tabloid
  • Bought The Times, The Sunday Times and the News of the World
  • The Murdoch press became very influential politically, mostly giving very strong support to Margaret Thatcher, not least against the unions
  • In the 1990s, support from the Murdoch press was crucial for the rise of New Labour

BOOK:
THE MINERS’ STRIKE AND OTHER INDUSTRIAL DISPUTES
• Led the newspaper proprietors that tried to reduce the power of the print unions
• Major confrontation at Murdoch’s Wapping plant starting in January 1986
• Print unions failed to prevent the publication or distribution of any newspapers and the strike collapsed after 13 months

49
Q

Lord Carrington (b. 1919) p.135

A
  • Inherited a seat in the House of Lords in 1938
  • Served in Heath’s government as Defence Secretary
  • Became Foreign Secretary in 1979 but resigned when Argentina invaded the Falklands, taking responsibility for the decision to withdraw the Endurance
  • Later Secretary General of NATO and involved in the negotiations over the break-up of Yugoslavia

BOOK:
THE FALKLANDS
• Approved the withdrawal of HMS Endurance in 1981 along with the Defence Secretary John Nott
• Withdrawal left the South Atlantic without any British naval presence
• The Argentinian military junta took this as a hint that Britain was willing to let the Falklands go
• General Galtieri, the leader of the junta, sent an invasion force to occupy the Falklands, claiming Argentine sovereignty over Las Malvinas
• Carrington resigned - a very principled resignation as he had advised against pulling out Endurance but had been overruled

50
Q

Ronald Reagan (1911-2004) p.138

A
  • President of the USA from 1981 to 1989
  • He had been a Hollywood actor in the 1930s and 1940s before entering politics
  • Served as the Governor of California from 1967 to 1975
  • Like Thatcher, he supported the extension of supply side economics and his economic policies were nicknamed ‘Reagonomics’ in the USA
  • Also shared Thatcher’s dislike of trade unions

BOOK:
THE ‘SPECIAL RELATIONSHIP, WITH USA
• Strong personal and ideological bond between Reagan and Thatcher
• Both were from the generation whose lives had been shaped by the Second World War
• Throughout the 1980s, the Thatcher-Reagan link was powerful in issues such as the Falklands War, deploying Cruise missiles and being tough with the USSR
• There were still some differences between them - in 1983 the US invaded Grenada after a Communist coup against the advice of Thatcher
• The bond lasted long after they were out of politics

51
Q

Pope John Paul II: Karen Wojtyla (1920-2005) p.138

A
  • Archbishop of Cracow
  • Elected Pope in 1979
  • A staunch anti-communist and his influence was greatly feared by the communist leaderships in Poland and the USSR
  • His official visit to Poland in 1980 drew enormous crowds and greatly strengthened the demands for reform from the Polish Solidarity movement (a trade union led by Lech Walesa

BOOK:
THATCHER AND THE SECOND COLD WAR 1979-85
• Emerged as a ‘cold warrior’ along with the British PM and the American president between 1979 and 1981
• Determined to challenge Soviet power both militarily and ideologically

52
Q

Mikhail Gorbachev (b. 1931) p.139

A
  • Tried to reform the Soviet communist system in order to save it
  • Emerged as leader of the USSR in 1985 and in 1987 he promoted his key ideas of perestroika (restructuring and modernisation) and glasnost (openness)
  • In trying to reform the USSR, he was willing to end the Cold War and let the Soviet satellite states in east Central Europe go their own way
  • Succeeded in ending the Cold War, but could not prevent the total collapse of communism

BOOK:
THATCHER’S INVOLVEMENT IN ENDING THE COLD WAR 1985-87
• Negotiated with Thatcher in the lead up to the end of the Cold War from 1985

53
Q

John Major (b. 1943) p.144

A
  • From a working-class background in Surrey
  • Left school at the age of 16 but worked his way up to executive level in the banking industry
  • Became a conservative councillor in the 1970s and was elected MP for Huntingdonshire in 1979
  • Joined Thatcher’s cabinet as Chief Secretary of the Treasury in 1987 and was promoted to Foreign Secretary and then Chancellor in 1989 before becoming PM in 1990

BOOK:
THE FALL OF THATCHER AND HER LEGACY
• Thatcher’s choice of successor
• Thatcherites saw him as ‘one of them’ in the rise to his leadership (this wasn’t accurate)
• Natural instinct was to unify the party, this would have been a difficult job due to the hostility towards Heseltine over the Westland Affair and a fierce determination amongst some to take revenge against those who had ‘betrayed Maggie’
• His first big task involved foreign affairs and Europe - the Gulf War came to a successful conclusion in 1991
• Wanted to see Britain take a place ‘at the very heart of Europe’
• Replaced poll tax with council tax in 1991 after lengthy discussions - scrapping it altogether risked splitting the party
• Wasted £1.5 billion but allowed Major to get away from an unpopular policy that could be blamed on Thatcher

54
Q

John Redwood (b. 1951) p.152

A
  • Known to his critics as ‘the Vulcan’
  • Secretary for Wales in John Major’s cabinet
  • A brilliant economic theorist, strongly in favour of monetarism
  • Had been a policy adviser to Thatcher
  • Leasing Eurosceptic
  • Ran against Major for the Conservative leadership in 1995
  • Surprisingly launched a joint leadership bid with the pro-European Ken Clarke in 1997, but the party opted for William Hague instead

BOOK:
CONSERVATIVE DIVISIONS
• Main challenger against Major in the 1995 leadership elections which Major had initiated to try to silence his critics and re-establish his authority
• Backed by Thatcherites and Eurosceptics in the election
• Heseltine had been made deputy PM and made sure everyone in the party knew he had voted for Major
• Resulted in 218 for Major and 89 for Redwood

55
Q

Michael Portillo (b. 1953) p.152

A
  • A keen admire of Thatcher and a Eurosceptic
  • Stayed loyal and served as Defence Secretary to Major between 1995 and 1997 despite rumours he would stand against him
  • After famously losing his seat in the 1997 election, he won the Kensington and Chelsea by-election in 1999 and served as Chancellor
  • Stood unsuccessfully for the party leadership in 2001 and in 2005 left the House of Commons to work in television and radio

BOOK:
CONSERVATIVE DIVISIONS
• Decided not to run in the Conservative leadership election of 1995, which made Redwood the main challenger

56
Q

Peter Mandelson (b. 1953) p.155

A
  • Became famous as the spin doctor who was behind the slick presentation of New Labour
  • Entered Parliament in 1992 and became a close adviser to Tony Blair
  • Twice a cabinet minister but on each occasion had to resign after a scandal; as industry minister in 1998 and Northern Ireland secretary in 2001
  • Left British politics to become an EU commissioner but returned to join Gordon Brown’s cabinet in 2008

BOOK:
REALIGNMENT UNDER (NEIL KINNOCK 1987-92), JOHN SMITH AND TONY BLAIR 1987-92
• Mastermind behind the professional presentation of the Labour Party after the heavy defeat in the 1987 election
• Became Kinnock’s director of communications in 1985

57
Q

John Smith (1938-94) p.156

A
  • MP for Monklands East, a Labour stronghold in the west of Scotland
  • Popular and respected at Westminster, with a political style that was calm and reassuring
  • Skilful performer in Parliament and on television
  • Became Labour leader in 1992, succeeding Kinnock
  • Might well have become PM but he suddenly died of a heart attack in 1994

BOOK:
REALIGNMENT UNDER NEIL KINNOCK, (JOHN SMITH 1992-94) AND TONY BLAIR
• Shadow chancellor of Kinnock at the time of his succession
• Seemed ideally suited to lead Labour towards victory as the Conservative Party’s troubles grew after Black Wednesday
• Seen as serious and someone to be trusted on the economy
• Signalled a shift in the Labour Party by moving to abolish the trade union block vote by introducing ‘One Member, One Vote’ (OMOV) for parliamentary candidates in 1993
• Many people argued that he might have achieved all that Blair did, if not more if he became PM, although others argue that he was very cautious and would not have acted as boldly as Blair did

58
Q

Tony Blair (b. 1953) p.156

A
  • Educated at a Scottish private school, Fettes college
  • Had few hang-ups about political ideology, argued that what matters is what works
  • Had fewer ties to the party’s history because he didn’t join until after university
  • PM from 1997 until he stepped down in 2007

BOOK:
REALIGNMENT UNDER NEIL KINNOCK, JOHN SMITH AND (TONY BLAIR 1994-2007)
• Avoided the danger of a divisive leadership contest by making a deal with his main rival, Gordon Brown
• Set out to further remodel the Labour ‘brand’
• The perception of ‘New Labour’ was intended to end the perception from the 1980s that Labour was unelectable
• Blair wanted a dramatic shift in in policy to show that Labour was breaking from its past
• In 1995 he persuaded the Labour Party to rewrite Clause IV of the Labour Party constitution
• Wanted Labour to drop the socialist ideas that appeared outdated since the collapse of communism in Eastern Europe and instead embrace the modern capitalist economy
• Skilful communicator

59
Q

Gordon Brown (b. 1951) p.156

A
  • Elected MP for Dunfermline in 1983 and was a protege of John Smith
  • Made a key role in modernising the Labour Party and in planning for the 1997 election
  • Chancellor of the Exchequer for ten years after Labour came to power - longer than any other chancellor in modern times
  • His relationship with Blair was often tense but they made a powerful and effective team
  • Succeeded Blair as PM in 2007

BOOK:
REALIGNMENT UNDER NEIL KINNOCK, JOHN SMITH AND (TONY BLAIR 1994-2007)
• Wanted to convince people that Labour was the party of prudence and economic competence rather than ‘tax-and-spend’ economic policies
• He promised that Labour would follow the Conservative spending plans in government, which made it difficult for the Conservatives to attack Labour’s economic policies
• Meant that business was no longer fearful of a Labour government

The Making of Modern Britain (4 decks)

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