1979 United Kingdom general election in the context of "Post-war consensus"

Thatcherism is a form of British conservative ideology named after Conservative Party leader Margaret Thatcher that relates to not just her political platform and particular policies but also her personal character and style of management while in office. Proponents of Thatcherism are referred to as Thatcherites. The term has been used to describe the principles of the British government under Thatcher from the 1979 general election to her resignation in 1990. In international terms, Thatcherites have been described as a part of the general socio-economic movement known as neoliberalism, with different countries besides the United Kingdom (such as the United States) sharing similar policies around expansionary capitalism.

Thatcherism represents a systematic, decisive rejection and reversal of the post-war consensus inside Great Britain in terms of governance, whereby the major political parties largely agreed on the central themes of Keynesianism, the welfare state, nationalised industry, and close regulation of the British economy before Thatcher's rise to prominence. Under her administration, there was one major exception to Thatcherite changes: the National Health Service (NHS), which was widely popular with the British public. In 1982, Thatcher promised that the NHS was "safe in our hands".

The 2019 United Kingdom general election was held on Thursday 12 December 2019, with 47,074,800 registered voters entitled to vote to elect 650 Members of Parliament (MPs) to the House of Commons. The governing Conservative Party, led by Prime Minister Boris Johnson, won a landslide victory with a majority of 80 seats, a net gain of 48, on 43.6 per cent of the popular vote, the highest percentage for any party since the 1979 general election, though with a narrower popular vote margin than that achieved by the Labour Party over the Conservatives at the 1997 general election. This was the second national election to be held in 2019 in the United Kingdom, the first being the 2019 European Parliament election.

After it lost its parliamentary majority at the 2017 general election, the Conservative Party governed in minority with the support of the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP). The prime minister, Theresa May, resigned in July 2019 after repeatedly failing to pass her Brexit withdrawal agreement in parliament. Johnson succeeded her as the leader of the Conservative Party and as prime minister in July 2019. Johnson could not persuade Parliament to approve a revised withdrawal agreement by the end of October, and chose to call a snap election, which the House of Commons supported under the Early Parliamentary General Election Act 2019. Opinion polls showed a firm lead for the Conservatives against the opposition Labour Party throughout the campaign.

Neil Gordon Kinnock, Baron Kinnock (born 28 March 1942) is a Welsh politician who was Leader of the Opposition and Leader of the Labour Party from 1983 to 1992. He was a Member of Parliament (MP) from 1970 to 1995, first for Bedwellty and then for Islwyn. He was Vice-President of the European Commission from 1999 to 2004. Kinnock was positioned on the soft left of the Labour Party.

Born and raised in South Wales, Kinnock was first elected to the House of Commons in the 1970 general election. He became the Labour Party's shadow education minister after the Conservatives won power in the 1979 general election. After the party under Michael Foot suffered a landslide defeat to Margaret Thatcher in the 1983 election, Kinnock was elected Leader of the Labour Party and Leader of the Opposition. During his tenure as leader, Kinnock proceeded to fight the party's left wing, especially the Militant tendency, and he opposed NUM leader Arthur Scargill's methods in the 1984–1985 miners' strike. He led the party during most of the Thatcher government, which included its third successive election defeat when Thatcher won the 1987 general election. Although Thatcher had won another landslide, Labour regained sufficient seats for Kinnock to remain Leader of the Opposition following the election.

Sir John Major (born 29 March 1943) is a British retired politician who served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom and Leader of the Conservative Party from 1990 to 1997. He previously held various Cabinet positions under Margaret Thatcher. Major was Member of Parliament (MP) for Huntingdon, formerly Huntingdonshire, from 1979 to 2001. Since stepping down, Major has focused on writing and his business, sporting, and charity work, and commentating on political developments.

Major left school before 16, worked as an insurance clerk, joined the Young Conservatives in 1959, and became a highly active member. He was elected to Lambeth London Borough Council in 1968 and, a decade later, to parliament as a Conservative MP at the 1979 general election. Major held junior government positions under Thatcher from 1984 to 1987, including parliamentary private secretary and assistant whip. He served as Chief Secretary to the Treasury from 1987 to 1989, Foreign Secretary in 1989, and Chancellor from 1989 to 1990. Following Thatcher's resignation in 1990, Major stood in the 1990 Conservative leadership election and emerged victorious, becoming prime minister.

The Social Democratic Party (SDP) was a centrist to centre-left political party in the United Kingdom. The party supported a mixed economy (favouring a system inspired by the German social market economy), electoral reform, European integration and a decentralised state while rejecting the possibility of trade unions being overly influential within industrial relations. The SDP officially advocated social democracy, and unofficially for social liberalism as well.

The SDP was founded on 26 March 1981 by four senior Labour Party moderates, dubbed the "Gang of Four": Roy Jenkins, David Owen, Bill Rodgers, and Shirley Williams, who issued the Limehouse Declaration. Owen and Rodgers were sitting Labour Members of Parliament (MPs); Jenkins had left Parliament in 1977 to serve as President of the European Commission, while Williams had lost her seat in the 1979 general election. All four had held cabinet experience in the 1970s before Labour lost power in 1979. The four left the Labour Party as a result of the January 1981 Wembley conference, which committed the party to unilateral nuclear disarmament and withdrawal from the European Economic Community. They also believed that Labour had become too left-wing, and had been infiltrated at the constituency party level by the Trotskyist Militant tendency, whose views and behaviour they considered to be at odds with the Parliamentary Labour Party and Labour voters.

Huntingdon is a market town in the Huntingdonshire district of Cambridgeshire, England. The town was given its town charter by King John in 1205. It was the county town of the historic county of Huntingdonshire. Oliver Cromwell was born there in 1599 and became one of its Members of Parliament (MP) in 1628. The former Conservative Prime Minister (1990–1997) John Major served as its MP from 1979 until his retirement in 2001.