The 1983 United Kingdom general election was held on Thursday 9 June 1983. It gave the Conservative Party under the leadership of Margaret Thatcher the most decisive election victory since that of the Labour Party in 1945,with a majority of 144 seats and the first of two consecutive landslide victories.
Shirley Vivian Teresa Brittain Williams,Baroness Williams of Crosby,was a British politician and academic. Originally a Labour Party Member of Parliament (MP),she served in the Labour cabinet from 1974 to 1979. She was one of the "Gang of Four" rebels who founded the Social Democratic Party (SDP) in 1981 and,at the time of her retirement from politics,was a Liberal Democrat.
The 1987 United Kingdom general election was held on Thursday 11 June 1987,to elect 650 members to the House of Commons. The election was the third consecutive general election victory for the Conservative Party,who won a majority of 102 seats and second landslide under the leadership of Margaret Thatcher,who became the first Prime Minister since the Earl of Liverpool in 1820 to lead a party into three successive electoral victories.
The SDP–Liberal Alliance was a centrist and social liberal political and electoral alliance in the United Kingdom.
David Anthony Llewellyn Owen,Baron Owen,is a British politician and physician who served as Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs as a Labour Party MP under James Callaghan from 1977 to 1979,and later led the Social Democratic Party (SDP). He was a Member of Parliament for 26 years,from 1966 to 1992.
David Martin Scott Steel,Baron Steel of Aikwood,is a retired Scottish politician. Elected as Member of Parliament for Roxburgh,Selkirk,and Peebles,followed by Tweeddale,Ettrick,and Lauderdale,he served as the final leader of the Liberal Party,from 1976 to 1988. His tenure spanned the duration of the alliance with the Social Democratic Party,which began in 1981 and concluded with the formation of the Liberal Democrats in 1988.
William Thomas Rodgers,Baron Rodgers of Quarry Bank,,is a British politician and life peer. As a Labour Party member of Parliament,he served as Secretary of State for Transport from 1976 to 1979,and was one of the "Gang of Four" of senior Labour politicians who defected to form the Social Democratic Party (SDP). He subsequently helped to lead the SDP into the merger that formed the Liberal Democrats in 1988,and later served as the party's leader in the House of Lords between 1997 and 2001.
Dick Taverne,Baron Taverne,is a British politician and life peer who served as Member of Parliament (MP) for Lincoln from 1962 to 1974. A member of the Liberal Democrats,he was a Labour MP until his deselection in 1972,following which he resigned his seat and won the subsequent by-election in 1973 as a Democratic Labour candidate.
Greenwich and Woolwich is a constituency represented in the House of Commons of the UK Parliament since 2015 by Matthew Pennycook of the Labour Party.
John Douglas Grant was a British politician who served as an MP of the United Kingdom parliament from 1970 to 1983. He was as a member of the Labour Party until he left in 1981 to join the new Social Democratic Party (SDP). He represented Islington East from 1970 to 1974 and Islington Central from 1974 to 1983.
Cambridge University Liberal Association (CULA) is the student branch of the Liberal Democrats for students at Cambridge University.
Rosemary Susan Barnes,OBE is an English charity organiser and former politician. She became nationally known when she won a by-election in 1987 for the Social Democratic Party.
The Social Democratic Party (SDP) formed in 1988 was a political party in the United Kingdom led by David Owen,which lasted for only two years. A successor party to the original Social Democratic Party (SDP),it was known informally as the 'continuing' SDP.
Ian William Wrigglesworth,Baron Wrigglesworth is a Liberal Democrat peer.
The 1982 Social Democratic Party leadership election was called following the formation of the Social Democratic Party (SDP). The party had been founded by the Gang of Four the previous year and had rapidly built up its membership,but lacked a formal leadership structure. Each of the Gang of Four was regarded as coequal leader.
Jesse Dickson Mabon,sometimes known as Dick Mabon,was a Scottish politician,physician and business executive. He was the founder of The Manifesto Group of Labour MPs,an alliance of moderate MPs who fought the perceived leftward drift of the Labour Party in the 1970s. He was a Labour Co-operative MP until October 1981,when he defected to the SDP. He lost his seat in 1983,and rejoined the Labour Party in 1991.
Michael Stuart Thomas is a former British politician,identified with the Labour Party until 1981 and thereafter with the Social Democratic Party (SDP). He became well known for his role in both the establishment of the SDP and then in the SDP's subsequent demise. The SDP's leader,Roy Jenkins,referred to Thomas as the "pint-sized Pavarotti",on the basis of his stocky build and beard together with his ebullient manner.
Margaret Thatcher was Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 4 May 1979 to 28 November 1990,during which time she led a Conservative majority government. She was the first woman to hold that office. During her premiership,Thatcher moved to liberalise the British economy through deregulation,privatisation,and the promotion of entrepreneurialism.
Charles Peter Kennedy was a British politician who served as Leader of the Liberal Democrats from 1999 to 2006,and was the Member of Parliament (MP) for Ross,Skye and Lochaber from 1983 to 2015.
The Social Democratic Party (SDP) was a centrist to centre-left political party in the United Kingdom. The party supported a mixed economy,electoral reform,European integration and a decentralised state while rejecting the possibility of trade unions being overly influential within the industrial sphere. The SDP officially advocated social democracy,but its actual propensity is evaluated as close to social liberalism.
