The 1990s saw a massive turning point in British politics, with the end of 18 years of Conservative rule and the beginning of a Labour government which would last another 13 years.
The Conservatives entered the 1990s led by a Prime Minister who had been an incumbent for over a decade. However, the time of Margaret Thatcher was running out - she had been rocked by a series of high-profile resignations (including that of her Deputy Prime Minister, Sir Geoffry Howe), and discontent over the economic recession and her position on Europe.
In the 1990 Conservative leadership election, Mrs Thatcher failed to win the first round outright, denied by Michael Heseltine, who had quit her Cabinet in 1986 in a dispute over the future of the Westland helicopter company. Thatcher initially promised to fight on, but tendered her resignation two days later, leaving Heseltine to be defeated in the next round by the Chancellor, John Major.
The Conservatives were just barely ahead of Labour in the polls, but Major's premiership during the first Gulf War in 1991 ensured him some popularity going into the 1992 General Election. Even so, he was seen as something of an underdog, with Labour tipped to at least force a hung parliament.
1992 General Election
The final result was a close-run thing, but the Conservatives clung onto power by a narrow margin. The Tory majority was reduced from over a hundred seats to just 21. Major's victory was the Conservatives' fourth consecutive electoral success, and with the disarray in the Labour Party continuing - Neil Kinnock quit as leader after the election loss - it seemed as if Tory hegemony was to continue well beyond the reign of Thatcher.
Major's position was embattled from the start, though, as within months of the election Black Wednesday struck. This was September 16, 1992, when Major was forced to withdraw the pound from the European Exchange Rate Mechanism because his government could not maintain the value of the currency within agreed levels. The cost of Black Wednesday was later estimated at over £3 billion.
The Government's economic credibility had been dealt a hammer blow right from the off. Labour surged ahead in the polls, and to make matters worse for Major he was about to face a dynamic new Opposition leader in the Commons. Tony Blair was about to take over the Labour Party.
The Rise of New Labour
Labour had been in chaos since 1979 - someone needed to step forward and unite the Party, to move them on from the fractious ways of old. The men who did this, who dragged the Labour Party out of the shadows and made it a real contender again, were Tony Blair, Gordon Brown and Peter Mandelson. They began the New Labour movement, and it was to shape the next decade of British politics and beyond.
Following the death of John Smith in 1994, Tony Blair struck a now infamous deal with Shadow Chancellor Gordon Brown to allow him to run for leadership with Brown as his number two. Although Margaret Beckett and John Prescott also stood, Blair took some 57% of the vote, winning with ease in the first and only round.
Blair set about re-branding and re-building the Labour Party, moving them into the centre of the political spectrum and targeting middle-class voters. This was a hugely successful movement, and had the support of a large section of the press thanks in no small part to Blair's 'spin doctor', Alastair Campbell, and the support of Rupert Murdoch's vast media empire.
1997's Landmark Landslide
By the time the 1997 General Election came around, the Conservatives were already haemorrhaging seats. A succession of by-election defeats had seen their 21-seat majority eroded, and by election day they were actually a minority Government.
The result of that General Election was Labour's biggest ever victory, and one of the Tories' biggest ever defeats. There was a huge swing to Labour, who gained 147 seats, against the Conservatives loss of 179. With Paddy Ashdown's Liberal Democrats gaining 26 seats, Labour ended with 416 MPs, their largest ever total, while the number of Tory MPs fell to 165, their lowest number since 1906. Several high-profile Conservatives, including Malcolm Rifkind and Michael Portillo, lost their seats.
Blair's First Term
Blair was swept into Downing Street with a huge mandate for change. Major quickly resigned as Conservative leader, replaced by William Hague. Blair had some immediate success as Prime Minister - all of the following facts come from this BBC profile of him. Chancellor Gordon Brown granted the Bank of England the independence to set the country's interest rate, a move popular with the financial community and which reassured them as to Labour's ability to govern the economy. However, the government decided against joining the Euro, preferring to maintain the pound sterling.
Blair introduced a raft of new legislation, including devolution for Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, granting them their own parliaments. He introduced the Human Rights Act in 1998 and the Freedom of Information Act in 2000, as well as removing hereditary peers from the House of Lords and officially allowing homosexuals into the military. He was also centrally involved in the Good Friday agreement in the Northern Ireland peace process, and in 1999 led the UK in supporting the NATO-led Kosovo War.
Blair was to be re-elected in 2001, and then again in 2005, the first Labour leader ever to achieve such a feat. The New Labour movement had turned British politics on its head, with the 1990s being the decade when the country switched from 18 years of Conservative rule to a long period of Labour rule.
Philip Sim - Philip Sim is a trainee journalist based in Aberdeen, Scotland. He graduated from the University of Dundee in 2009 with an honours degree ...
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