By-elections and what ifs
In the comments on my post about by-elections below, Alex raises a what-if that I was considering while reading the site and writing the post - what if there'd been a rapprochement between the Social & Liberal Democrats (the party now known as the Liberal Democrats) and the SDP (the 'Owenite' rump SDP that didn't join the merger between the old SDP and the Liberal Party)
A quick search on soc.history.what-if reveals that there's been little discussion of the possibilities - though Anthony Wells discusses some of the issues here - but there are a lot of possible changes to the British political scene in the 90s that could result from an SDP or SLD win in Richmond.
It's worth remembering that there was (and still is - many Liberal Democrats have a visceral reaction to the name 'David Owen') a lot of bad blood between the two parties after the merger, mainly because a lot of egos were bruised during and after the merger of the SDP and the Liberal Party into the SLD, and the decision of the 'Owenites' to go and form their own new SDP afterwards. For a time in the late 80s, it did appear that the two parties would effectively destroy each other (combined, they were polling little more than 10%, and were beaten into 4th place by the Greens at the European elections in 1989). Then as now, by-elections were one of the main ways for a third party to make a mark (the old SDP-Liberal Alliance had made several gains at by-elections between 1981 and 1987) so when both parties sensed a chance of a gain at a by-election, they both went for it, which of course meant that they were competing against each other for the same votes. While this tended to lead to them squabbling over third place a lot of the time, there were two elections where it may have made a difference - Epping Forest in December 1988 and Richmond in February 1989. In Epping Forest, the combined total for the two parties was within 500 of the victorious Conservative (Steve Norris) while in Richmond, the combined total was 9,000 more than William Hague's winning total.
In retrospect, the solution seems obvious - the SDP don't stand a candidate in Epiing Forest, the SLD withdraw from Richmond, thus causing a Tory loss in one or both of them - but logical as that seems (and many suggested it at the time) it misses the fact that there was too much bad blood between the parties and that neither would give way for the other. Anthony's scenario - having a slightly stronger SDP - is perhaps the most likely other outcome, but there is one other (if more unlikely) option and that's to have the two elections taking place even closer than they did. If Sir John Biggs-Davison (whose death triggered the Epping Forest by-election) survives for another month or so, then the two by-elections will either take place on the same date, or close enough that campaigns will overlap. In that instance, we might not see the parties refusing to nominate a candidate, but some kind of tacit understanding (probably through back channels, of course, as it's hard to picture Paddy Ashdown and David Owen agreeing anything between them) that the SDP will concentrate on Richmond, while the SLD will concentrate on Epping Forest.
In the long run, I'm not sure that it'll make much change to the future of the SDP or the Liberal Democrats (as the SLD would soon become) as the SDP was always on the back foot nationally against the Liberal Democrats, having a smaller membership, less councillors and, even if they win Richmond, only 4 MPs. The more interesting question is if, having suffered two by-election defeats in early 1989, Mrs Thatcher's position is more precarious and whether that might tempt Heseltine to make his move a year earlier than he did? Will Lawson still resign in October, and if he does, is it more damaging? And if Thatcher falls in 1989 who replaces her? And how do the nineties progress without (presumably) Shagger Norris and William Hague?
(I've cross-posted a version of this post to soc.history.what-if as well)
A quick search on soc.history.what-if reveals that there's been little discussion of the possibilities - though Anthony Wells discusses some of the issues here - but there are a lot of possible changes to the British political scene in the 90s that could result from an SDP or SLD win in Richmond.
It's worth remembering that there was (and still is - many Liberal Democrats have a visceral reaction to the name 'David Owen') a lot of bad blood between the two parties after the merger, mainly because a lot of egos were bruised during and after the merger of the SDP and the Liberal Party into the SLD, and the decision of the 'Owenites' to go and form their own new SDP afterwards. For a time in the late 80s, it did appear that the two parties would effectively destroy each other (combined, they were polling little more than 10%, and were beaten into 4th place by the Greens at the European elections in 1989). Then as now, by-elections were one of the main ways for a third party to make a mark (the old SDP-Liberal Alliance had made several gains at by-elections between 1981 and 1987) so when both parties sensed a chance of a gain at a by-election, they both went for it, which of course meant that they were competing against each other for the same votes. While this tended to lead to them squabbling over third place a lot of the time, there were two elections where it may have made a difference - Epping Forest in December 1988 and Richmond in February 1989. In Epping Forest, the combined total for the two parties was within 500 of the victorious Conservative (Steve Norris) while in Richmond, the combined total was 9,000 more than William Hague's winning total.
In retrospect, the solution seems obvious - the SDP don't stand a candidate in Epiing Forest, the SLD withdraw from Richmond, thus causing a Tory loss in one or both of them - but logical as that seems (and many suggested it at the time) it misses the fact that there was too much bad blood between the parties and that neither would give way for the other. Anthony's scenario - having a slightly stronger SDP - is perhaps the most likely other outcome, but there is one other (if more unlikely) option and that's to have the two elections taking place even closer than they did. If Sir John Biggs-Davison (whose death triggered the Epping Forest by-election) survives for another month or so, then the two by-elections will either take place on the same date, or close enough that campaigns will overlap. In that instance, we might not see the parties refusing to nominate a candidate, but some kind of tacit understanding (probably through back channels, of course, as it's hard to picture Paddy Ashdown and David Owen agreeing anything between them) that the SDP will concentrate on Richmond, while the SLD will concentrate on Epping Forest.
In the long run, I'm not sure that it'll make much change to the future of the SDP or the Liberal Democrats (as the SLD would soon become) as the SDP was always on the back foot nationally against the Liberal Democrats, having a smaller membership, less councillors and, even if they win Richmond, only 4 MPs. The more interesting question is if, having suffered two by-election defeats in early 1989, Mrs Thatcher's position is more precarious and whether that might tempt Heseltine to make his move a year earlier than he did? Will Lawson still resign in October, and if he does, is it more damaging? And if Thatcher falls in 1989 who replaces her? And how do the nineties progress without (presumably) Shagger Norris and William Hague?
(I've cross-posted a version of this post to soc.history.what-if as well)
Nick got away with this at 1:26 AM
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