As the election results flowed in on 1st March 1974, it was clear that the result was going to be impossibly close. Three weeks earlier, Edward Heath had called a snap poll on the theme of 'Who Governs Britain?' in response to an industrial challenge from the National Union of Mineworkers, amidst the chaos of the Three Day Week. Despite every poll predicting a comfortable government victory, the actual result hung on a knife-edge; the Tories polled some 200,000 more votes than Labour, but took 297 seats to Labour's 301. The Liberal Party was rewarded with nearly a fifth of the vote, but took a mere 14 seats. The country waited with baited breath to see what would happen next.
For Heath, the result was a huge personal blow. But he still believed that, as the party leader with the greatest share of the vote, he had the right to try and govern. So he invited Liberal leader Jeremy Thorpe to talk coalitions. Although Thorpe was keen, he came with two main demands; proportional representation, and Heath's resignation. When this became public, many came to believe Harold Wilson would end up leading a minority Labour government. How wrong they were.
To national shock, Heath agreed to all of Thorpe's demands, and advised the Queen to send for his hugely popular deputy, Willie Whitelaw, as the next Prime Minister. Whitelaw was in his constituency recovering from flu, and was shocked to find a government messenger hammering on the door with the news. However Heath was not gone completely, he remained as Foreign Secretary. Whitelaw quickly showed a flair for coalition politics; by making the hugely popular ex-Liberal leader Jo Grimond the Secretary of State for Scotland, he ensured the tacit support of the SNP. Despite Labour's howls of protest, Whitelaw now had a majority government, crucially one which also proved a popular hit with the public, who liked to see politicans working together.
The new government managed to use its initial popularity to settle with the NUM, enabling the sense of crisis stoked by the Three-Day Week to ebb. Meanwhile, public spending, which had spiralled out of control under Heath, was reigned in and better targeted to help kick-start the economy. Big capital projects were of some help, with London Maplin airport helping to generate activity. Labour's potentially disastrous plans to renegotiate Britain's terms of EEC entry were mercifully avoided, and Whitelaw proved to be a good European leader. He also became a strong ally of the US President Gerald Ford, who was battling to restore credibility to the office following Watergate. Slowly, growth returned to the UK economy and inflation began to fall. Away from the economy, much else got done. With Thorpe at the Home Office, measures to help racial and gender inequality were rammed through Parliament. The inclusion of Grimond in the Cabinet led to added impetus for greater devolution, although the thorny West Lothian question posed by Labour never quite resolved itself. The Speaker's Conference on Proportional Representation proved even thornier, with Labour, now led by Denis Healey, unwilling to give ground on the electoral system. Eventually, it was decided to stage a national referendum in mid 1975 on the issue, but amid dismal turnout the plans were rejected.
But it wasn't just the Liberals in the Cabinet who made waves. The new Energy Secretary, Sir Keith Joseph, felt compelled to apologise to voters for the failings of the government to develop a full-proof energy policy, and vowed to put this right, leading to heavy investment in North Sea oil and gas. And although much mocked at the time, the warnings of the science graduate in charge of the Department of the Environment were later hailed by the green lobby as representing the first politician to identify the challenge of global warming. The government seemed to have turned a corner and ended the 1970s crisis.
Then the markets struck. In 1976 sterling came under increasing pressure, with external markets spooked by the government's tiny majority and the sluggish economy. In the end, Whitelaw was forced to call in a team from the IMF and ask for a loan to prop up the economy. The images of the Chancellor, Robert Carr, turning away from Heathrow airport on the way to a finance ministers meeting because he could not afford to be out of contact was the defining image of the crisis. The IMF insisted on deep cuts to public spending, and although Whitelaw and Carr were able to ease the cuts being imposed, the damage to the government was serious. Compounding this, from 1976 Thorpe was placed under intense scrutiny about his personal life and his sexuality. The lock out at the Grunwick film plant showed how little the government had actually achieved in controlling the unions.
But it was devolution which tore the government apart. The minority pact depended upon the support of the SNP and Plaid Cymru to stay alive in the lobbies, and when progress towards devolution was not as rapid as these parties would like, they pulled the plug on the government. The collapse of the United Ulster Unionist Council meant that in May 1978 the government lost a motion of no confidence in parliament, and then the following general election, which saw Labour returned to office in a landslide. With North Sea oil revenues providing seemingly endless money, the golden years of Labour rule were underway.
P.S. Whitelaw Cabinet, 1974
Prime Minister- Willie Whitelaw (Con)
Chancellor of the Exchequer- Robert Carr (Con)
Foreign Secretary- Edward Heath (Con)
Home Secretary and Deputy Prime Minister- Jeremy Thorpe (Lib)
Defence Secretary- Ian Gilmour (Con)
Health and Social Security Secretary- Peter Walker (Con)
Education and Science Secretary- Geoffrey Rippon (Con)
Environment Secretary- Margaret Thatcher (Con)
Trade and Industry Secretary- Jim Prior (Con)
Employment Secretary- John Pardoe (Lib)
Energy Secretary- Sir Keith Joseph (Con)
Scottish Secretary- Jo Grimond (Lib)
Welsh Secretary- Peter Thomas (Con)
Northern Irish Secretary- Francis Pym (Con)
Chief Secretary to the Treasury- Michael Heseltine (Con)
Agriculture, Fisheries and Food Minister- Joseph Godber (Con)
Leader of the House of Commons- Maurice Macmillan (Con)
Leader of the House of Lords- Lord Carrington (Con)
Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster and Minister for the Arts- Norman St John Stevas (Con)
No comments:
Post a Comment