A single parent is a person who has a child or children but
does not have a spouse or live-in partner to assist in the upbringing or
support of the child. Reasons for becoming a single parent include decease, divorce, break-up, abandonment, becoming widowed, domestic violence, rape, childbirth by a single person or single-person adoption. A single parent family is a family with children that is headed by a single parent.
History
Single parenthood has been common historically due to parental mortality rate due to disease, wars, homicide, work accidents and maternal mortality.
Historical estimates indicate that in French, English, or Spanish
villages in the 17th and 18th centuries at least one-third of children
lost one of their parents during childhood; in 19th-century Milan, about half of all children lost at least one parent by age 20; in 19th-century China, almost one-third of boys had lost one parent or both by the age of 15. Such single parenthood was often short in duration, since remarriage rates were high.
Divorce
was generally rare historically (although this depends by culture and
era), and divorce especially became very difficult to obtain after the
fall of the Roman Empire, in Medieval Europe, due to strong involvement
of ecclesiastical courts in family life (though annulment and other forms of separation were more common).
Demographics
Households
Among all households in OECD
countries in 2011, the proportion of single-parent households was in
3-11% the range, with an average of 7.5%. It was highest in Australia
(10%), Canada (10%), Mexico (10%), United States (10%), Lithuania (10%),
Costa Rica (11%), Latvia (11%) and New Zealand (11%), while it was
lowest in Japan (3%), Greece (4%), Switzerland (4%), Bulgaria (5),
Croatia (5%), Germany (5%), Italy (5%) and Cyprus (5%). The proportion
was 9% in both Ireland and the United Kingdom.
Among households with children in 2005/09, the proportion of
single-parent households was 10% in Japan, 16% in the Netherlands, 19%
in Sweden, 20% in France, 22% in Denmark, 22% in Germany, 23% in
Ireland, 25% in Canada, 25% in the United Kingdom, and 30% in the United
States. The U.S. proportion increased from 20% in 1980 to 30% in 2008.
In all OECD countries, most single-parent households were headed
by a mother. The proportion headed by a father varied between 9% and
25%. It was lowest in Estonia (9%), Costa Rica (10%), Cyprus (10%),
Japan (10%), Ireland (10%) and the United Kingdom (12%), while it was
highest in Norway (22%), Spain (23%), Sweden (24%), Romania (25%) and
the United States (25%). These numbers were not provided for Canada,
Australia or New Zealand.
Children
In
2016/17, the proportion of children living in a single-parent household
varied between 6% and 28% in the different OECD countries, with an OECD
country average of 17%. It was lowest in Turkey (2015, 6%), Greece (8%),
Croatia (8%) and Poland (10%), while it was highest in France (23%),
United Kingdom (23%), Belgium (25%), Lithuania (25%), United States
(27%) and Latvia (28%). It was 19% in Ireland and Canada.
Among children living in a single-parent household, most live
primarily with their mother, others primarily with their father, while
other children have a shared parenting
arrangement where they spend an approximately equal amount of time with
their two parents. Among those living primarily with one single parent,
most live with their mother. In 2016 (or latest year available), the
proportion of 6-12 year olds living primarily with their single father
ranged between 5% and 36% among the different OECD countries. It was
highest in Belgium (17%), Iceland (19%), Slovenia (20%), France (22%),
Norway (23%) and Sweden (36%), while it was lowest in Lithuania (4%),
Ireland (5%), Poland (5%), Estonia (7%), Austria (7%) and the United
Kingdom (8%). It was 15% in the United States.
In 2005/06, the proportion of 11- to 15-year-old children living
in a shared parenting arrangement versus with only one of their parents
varied between 1% and 17%, being the highest in Sweden. It was 5% in
Ireland and the United States, and 7% in Canada and the United Kingdom. By 2016/17, the percentage in Sweden had increased to 28%.
Impact on parents
Over
9.5 million American families are run by one woman. Single mothers are
likely to have mental health issues, financial hardships, live in a low
income area, and receive low levels of social support. All of these
factors are taken into consideration when evaluating the mental health
of single mothers. The occurrence of moderate to severe mental disability was more pronounced among single mothers at 28.7% compared to partnered mothers at 15.7%. These mental disabilities include but are not limited to anxiety
and depression. Financial hardships also affect the mental health of
single mothers. Women, ages 15–24, were more likely to live in a low
socio-economic area, have one child, and not to have completed their
senior year of high school. These women reported to be in the two lowest
income areas, and their mental health was much poorer than those in
higher income areas.
A similar study on the mental health of single mothers attempted
to answer the question, "Are there differences in the prevalence of
psychiatric disorders, between married, never-married, and
separated/divorced mothers?" Statistically, never married, and
separated/divorced mothers had the highest regularities of drug abuse,
personality disorder and PTSD.
The family structure can become a trigger for mental health issues in
single mothers. They are especially at risk for having higher levels of
depressive symptoms.
Studies from the 1970s showed that single mothers who are not financially stable are more likely to experience depression. In a more current study it was proven that financial strain was directly correlated with high levels of depression. Among low-income single mothers, depressive symptoms may be as high as 60%.
Inadequate access to mental health care services is prevalent
amongst impoverished women. Low-income women are less likely to receive
mental health care for numerous reasons. Mental health services remain
inequitable for low-income, more so, low-income single women are more
likely to suffer from depression, anxiety, and other poor mental health
outcomes. Researchers Copeland and Snyder (2011) addressed the barriers
low-income single mothers have on receiving mental health care, "Visible
barriers often include the lack of community resources, transportation,
child care, convenient hours, and financial resources." Meanwhile,
low-income single mothers are more likely to bring their children in for
mental health treatment than themselves. Researchers Copeland and
Snyder analyzed sixty-four African American mothers who brought their
children in for mental health treatment. These mothers were then
screened for mild, moderate, and severe depression and/or anxiety. After
three months the researchers used an ethnographic interview to address
whether or not the participants used mental health services that were
referred to them. Results indicated that the majority of the
participants did not use the referred mental health care services for
reasons that included: fear of losing their children, being hospitalized
and/or stigmatized by their community counterparts.
According to David Blankenhorn, Patrick Fagan, Mitch Pearlstein, David Popenoe and Barbara Dafoe Whitehead, living in a single parent family is strongly correlated with school failure and problems of delinquency, drug use, teenage pregnancies, poverty, and welfare dependency in the United States. Using multilevel modelling, Suet-Ling Pong
has shown that a high proportion of American children from single
parent families perform poorly on mathematics and reading achievement
tests.
In Sweden, Emma Fransson
et al. have shown that children living with one single parent have
worse well-being in terms of physical health behavior, mental health,
peer friendships, bullying, cultural activities, sports, and family
relationships, compared to children from intact families. As a contrast,
children in a shared parenting
arrangement that live approximately equal amount of time with their
divorced mother and father have about the same well-being as children
from intact families and better outcomes than children with only one
custodial parent.
The United Kingdom Office for National Statistics
has reported that children of single parents, after controlling for
other variables like family income, are more likely to have problems,
including being twice as likely to suffer from mental illness.
Both British and American researchers show that children with no
fathers are three times more likely to be unhappy, and are also more
likely to engage in anti-social behavior, abuse substances and engage in
juvenile deliquency.
In American society
In
2017, the U.S Census Bureau published a report breaking down the number
of children living in single parent households by the race of the
family. The report found dramatic disparities in the rates of single
parent families among the races examined.
There is some debate among experts as to what the important component
of the family structure is, particularly in the US, centring on whether
or not a complete family or the love and affection of the children's
parents is more important. There are even some that argue that a
single-parent family is not even really a family.
In the United States, where living standards are generally high,
single-parent households are on average much poorer, a pattern largely
explained by the lack of a second source of income in the home itself.
With respect to this, recent public policy debates have centered on
whether or not government should give aid to single parent households,
which some believe will reduce poverty and improve their situation, or
instead focus on wider issues like protecting employment. In addition, there is a debate on the behavioral effects of children with incarcerated parents, and how losing one or both parents to incarceration affects their academic performance and social well-being with others.
It is encouraged that each parent respects the other, at least in the child's presence, and provide child support for the primary caregiver, when parents are not married or separated.
The civil behaviour among separated parents has a direct effect on how
the child copes with their situation; this is especially seen in younger
children who do not yet understand their familial separation, requiring
both parents to establish a limited friendship to support the
upbringing of their child.
Causes of single-parenthood
Widowed parents
Statue of a mother at the Yasukuni Shrine, dedicated to war widows who raised their children alone
Historically, death of a partner was a common cause of single parenting. Diseases and maternal death not infrequently resulted in a widower
or widow responsible for children. At certain times wars might also
deprive significant numbers of families of a parent. Improvements in
sanitation and maternal care have decreased mortality for those of
reproductive age, making death a less common cause of single parenting.
Divorced parents
Divorce statistics
In 2009, the overall divorce rate was around 9/1000 in the United States.
It was also found that more influence came from the south, with the
rates there being about 10.5/1000, as opposed to the north where it was
around 7/1000. This resulted in about 1.5% (around 1 million) children living in the house of a recently divorced parent in the same year. Along with this, it has been shown that for the past 10 years or so, first marriages have a 40% chance of ending in divorce.
And, for other marriages after a first divorce, the chance of another
divorce increases. In 2003, a study showed that about 69% of children in
American living in a household that was a different structure than the
typical nuclear family.
This was broken down into about 30% living with a stepparent, 23%
living with a biological mother, 6% with grandparents as caregivers, 4%
with a biological father, 4% with someone who was not a direct relative,
and a small 1% living with a foster family.
Around the mid-1990s, there was a significant number of single
parents raising children, with 1.3 million single fathers and 7.6
million single mothers in the United States alone.
However, many parents desire, or attempt, to get sole custody, which
would make them a single parent, but are unsuccessful in the court
process. There are many parents who may single parent, but do so without
official custody, further biasing statistics.
Child custody in reference to divorce refers to which parent is allowed to make important decisions about the children involved. Physical custody
refers to which parent the child lives with. Among divorced parents,
"parallel parenting" refers to parenting after divorce in which each
parent does so independently; this is most common. In comparison,
cooperative parenting occurs when the parents involved in the child's
life work together around all involved parties' schedules and
activities, and this is far less common. After a certain "crisis
period," most children resume normal development; however, their future
relationships are often affected, as they lack a model upon which to
base a healthy long-term relationship. Nonetheless, as adults children
of divorcees cope better with change.
Children are affected by divorce in many different ways, varying
by the circumstances and age of the child. Young children ages two to
six are generally the most fearful of parental separation, and often
feel abandoned or confused. Both boys and girls have the same amount of
trouble coping, but often show this in different ways. Nonetheless this
age group adapts best to their situations, as they are often too young
to remember their non-custodial parent vividly. Children ages seven to
twelve are much better at expressing emotions and accepting parentage
breakage, but often distrust their parents, rely on outside help and
support for encouragement, and may manifest social and academic
problems. Adolescents cope the worst with divorce; they often struggle
most with the change, and may even turn away from their family entirely,
dealing with their situation on their own. They often have problems
expressing feelings, similar to far younger children, and may have
adjustment issues with long-term relationships due to these feelings.
Keeping in touch with both parents and having a healthy relationship
with both mother and father appears to have the most effect on a child's
behavior; which leads to an easier time coping with the divorce as well
as development through the child's life.
Children will do better with their parents divorce if they have a
smooth adjustment period. One way to make this adjustment easier on
children is to let them "remain in the same neighborhoods and schools
following divorce."
Many out-of-wedlock births are unintentional. Out-of-wedlock births
are frequently not acceptable to society, and they often result in
single parenting. A partner may also leave as he or she may want to
shirk responsibility of bringing up the child. This also may harm the
child. Where they are not acceptable, they sometimes result in forced marriage, however such marriages fail more often than others.
In the United States, the rate of unintended pregnancy is higher
among unmarried couples than among married ones. In 1990, 73% of births
to unmarried women were unintended at the time of conception, compared
to about 44% of births overall.
Mothers with unintended pregnancies, and their children, are
subject to numerous adverse health effects, including increased risk of
violence and death, and the children are less likely to succeed in
school and are more likely to live in poverty and be involved in crime.
"Fragile families" are usually caused by an unintended pregnancy
out of wedlock. Usually in this situation the father is not completely
in the picture and the relationship between the mother, father, and
child is consistently unstable. As well as instability, "fragile
families" are often limited in resources such as human capital and
money. The kids that come from these families are more likely to be
hindered within school and don't succeed as well as kids who have strictly single parents or two parent homes.
Usually within these families the father plans to stick around and help
raise the child but once the child is born the fathers do not stay for
much longer and only one third stay after five years of the child's
birth.
Most of these fragile families come from low economic status to begin
with and the cycle appears to continue; once the child grows up they are
just as likely to still be poor.
Most fragile families end with the mother becoming a single parent,
leaving it even more difficult to come out of the poverty cycle. The
gender of the baby seems to have no effect if the father is not living
with the mother at the time of the birth, meaning they are still likely
to leave after one year of the child's birth. Yet there is some evidence
that suggests that if the father is living with the mother at the time
of the birth he is more likely to stay after one year if the child is a
son rather than a daughter.
Choice
Some
individuals choose to become pregnant and parent on their own. Others
choose to adopt. Typically referred to in the West as "Single Mothers by
Choice" or "Choice Moms" though, fathers also (less commonly) may
choose to become single parents through adoption or surrogacy. Many turn
to single parenthood by choice after not finding the right person to
raise children with, and for women, it often comes out of a desire to
have biological children before it is too late to do so.
Single-parent adoption
A single mother and child
History
Single
parent adoptions have existed since the mid 19th century. Men were
rarely considered as adoptive parents, and were considered far less
desired. Often, children adopted by a single person were raised in pairs
rather than alone, and many adoptions by lesbians and gay men were
arranged as single parent adoptions. During the mid 19th century many
state welfare officials made it difficult if not impossible for single
persons to adopt, as agencies searched for "normal" families with
married men and women. In 1965, the Los Angeles Bureau of Adoptions
sought single African-Americans for African-American orphans for whom
married families could not be found. In 1968, the Child Welfare League of America
stated that married couples were preferred, but there were "exceptional
circumstances" where single parent adoptions were permissible.
Not much has changed with the adoption process since the 1960s.
However, today, many countries only allow women to adopt as a single
parent, and many others only allow men to adopt boys.
Considerations
Single
parent adoptions are controversial. They are, however, still preferred
over divorcees, as divorced parents are considered an unnecessary stress
on the child.
In one study, the interviewers asked children questions about their new
lifestyle in a single-parent home. The interviewer found that when
asked about fears, a high proportion of children feared illness or
injury to the parent. When asked about happiness, half of the children
talked about outings with their single adoptive parent.
A single person wanting to adopt a child has to be mindful of the
challenges they may face, and there are certain agencies that will not
work with single adoptive parents at all. Single parents will typically
only have their own income to live off of, and thus might not have a
backup plan for potential children in case something happens to them. Traveling is also made more complex, as the child must either be left in someone else's care, or taken along.
By country
Australia
In 2003, 14% of all Australian households were single-parent families.
In Australia 2011, out of all families 15.9% were single parent
families. Out of these families 17.6% of the single parents were males,
whilst 82.4% were females.
Single people are eligible to apply for adoption
in all states of Australia, except for Queensland and South Australia.
They are able to apply for adoption both to Australian born and
international born children, although not many other countries allow
single parent adoptions.
Single parents in Australia are eligible for support payments
from the government, but only if they are caring for at least one child
under the age of eight.
New Zealand
At the 2013 census, 17.8% of New Zealand
families were single-parent, of which five-sixths were headed by a
female. Single-parent families in New Zealand have fewer children than
two-parent families; 56% of single-parent families have only one child
and 29% have two children, compared to 38% and 40% respectively for
two-parent families.
United Kingdom
In the United Kingdom,
about 1 out of 4 families with dependent children are single-parent
families, 8 to 11 percent of which have a male single-parent.UK poverty figures show that 52% of single parent families are below
the Government-defined poverty line (after housing costs).
Single parents in the UK are almost twice as likely to be in low-paid
jobs as other workers (39% of working single parents compared with 21%
of working people nationally). This is highlighted in a report published
by Gingerbread, funded by Trust for London and Barrow Cadbury Trust.
In the United States, since the 1960s, there has been a marked
increase in the number of children living with a single parent. The jump
was caused by an increase in births to unmarried women and by the
increasing prevalence of divorces among couples. In 2010, 40.7% of
births in the US were to unmarried women.
In 2000, 11% of children were living with parents who had never been
married, 15.6% of children lived with a divorced parent, and 1.2% lived
with a parent who was widowed. The results of the 2010 United States Census showed that 27% of children live with one parent, consistent with the emerging trend noted in 2000. The most recent data of December 2011 shows approximately 13.7 million single parents in the U.S.
Mississippi
leads the nation with the highest percent of births to unmarried mothers with 54% in 2014, followed by Louisiana, New Mexico, Florida and South Carolina.
In 2006, 12.9 million families in the US were headed by a single parent, 80% of which were headed by a female.
According to a 2016 report from the United States Census Bureau,
the percentage of children living in families with two parents
decreased from 88 to 69 between 1960 and 2016. Of those 50.7 million
children living in families with two parents, 47.7 million live with two
married parents and 3.0 million live with two unmarried parents.
The percentage of children living with single parents increased
substantially in the United States during the second half of the 20th
century. According to a 2013 Child Trends study, only 9% of children lived with single parents in the 1960s—a figure that increased to 28% in 2012. The main cause of single parent families are high rates of divorce and non-marital childbearing.
The Supreme Court of India and various High Courts of India have recognized the rights of single mothers to give birth and raise children..The High Court of Kerala,
has declared in a case argued by Advocate Aruna A. that, the birth
registration authorities cannot insist on the details of the father for
registration of birth of a child born to a single mother, conceived
through IVF. The Delhi High Court
has held that “mother’s name is sufficient in certain cases like the
present one to apply for passport, especially as a single woman can be a
natural guardian and also a parent”
Considering these socio-legal transformations, a study suggested that
despite facing numerous challenges, single mothers who are raising their
children with little support from the families, society or state are
challenging the dominant `male breadwinner and provider model' while
redefining the heteronormative model of parenting
^Mayor of London and 11 combined authority mayors. ^ Councillors of local authorities in England (including 25 aldermen of the City of London) and Scotland, principal councils in Wales and local councils in Northern Ireland.
Origins and the Independent Labour Party (1860–1900)
The original Liberty logo, in use until 1983.
The Labour Party originated in the late 19th century, meeting the
demand for a new political party to represent the interests and needs of
the urban working class, a demographic which had increased in number,
and many of whom only gained suffrage with the passage of the Representation of the People Act 1884.
Some members of the trades union movement became interested in moving
into the political field, and after further extensions of the voting
franchise in 1867 and 1885, the Liberal Party endorsed some trade-union sponsored candidates. The first Lib–Lab candidate to stand was George Odger in the Southwark
by-election of 1870. In addition, several small socialist groups had
formed around this time, with the intention of linking the movement to
political policies. Among these were the Independent Labour Party (ILP), the intellectual and largely middle-class Fabian Society, the Marxist Social Democratic Federation and the Scottish Labour Party.
At the 1895 general election, the ILP put up 28 candidates but won only 44,325 votes. Keir Hardie,
the leader of the party, believed that to obtain success in
parliamentary elections, it would be necessary to join with other
left-wing groups. Hardie's roots as a lay preacher contributed to an
ethos in the party which led to the comment by 1950s General Secretary Morgan Phillips that "Socialism in Britain owed more to Methodism than Marx".
Keir Hardie, one of the Labour Party's founders and its first leader.
In 1899, a Doncaster member of the Amalgamated Society of Railway Servants, Thomas R. Steels, proposed in his union branch that the Trade Union Congress
call a special conference to bring together all left-wing organisations
and form them into a single body that would sponsor Parliamentary
candidates. The motion was passed at all stages by the TUC, and the
proposed conference was held at the Congregational Memorial Hall
on Farringdon Street, London on 26 and 27 February 1900. The meeting
was attended by a broad spectrum of working-class and left-wing
organisations—the trades unions present represented almost half of the
membership of the TUC.
After a debate, the 129 delegates passed Hardie's motion to
establish "a distinct Labour group in Parliament, who shall have their
own whips, and agree upon their policy, which must embrace a readiness
to cooperate with any party which for the time being may be engaged in
promoting legislation in the direct interests of labour."
This created an association called the Labour Representation Committee
(LRC), meant to co-ordinate attempts to support MPs sponsored by trade
unions and represent the working-class population. It had no single leader, and in the absence of one, the Independent Labour Party nominee Ramsay MacDonald was elected as Secretary. He had the difficult task of keeping the various strands of opinions in the LRC united. The 1900 general election,
also referred to as the "Khaki election", came too soon for the new
party to campaign effectively and total expenses for the election only
came to £33. Only 15 candidatures were sponsored, but two were successful: Keir Hardie in Merthyr Tydfil and Richard Bell in Derby.
Support for the LRC was boosted by the 1901 Taff Vale Case,
a dispute between strikers and a railway company that ended with the
union being ordered to pay £23,000 damages for a strike. The judgement
effectively made strikes illegal, since employers could recoup the cost
of lost business from the unions. The apparent acquiescence of the
Conservative Government of Arthur Balfour to industrial and business interests (traditionally the allies of the Liberal Party
in opposition to the Conservatives' landed interests) intensified
support for the LRC against a government that appeared to have little
concern for the industrial proletariat and its problems.
Labour Party plaque from Caroone House, 14 Farringdon Street.
In their first meeting after the election the group's members of
Parliament decided to adopt the name "The Labour Party" formally (15
February 1906). Keir Hardie, who had taken a leading role in getting the
party established, was elected as Chairman of the Parliamentary Labour
Party (in effect, the leader), although only by one vote over David Shackleton after several ballots. In the party's early years the Independent Labour Party
(ILP) provided much of its activist base as the party did not have
individual membership until 1918 but operated as a conglomerate of
affiliated bodies. The Fabian Society
provided much of the intellectual stimulus for the party. One of the
first acts of the new Liberal Government was to reverse the Taff Vale
judgement.
The People's History Museum in Manchester holds the minutes of the first Labour Party meeting in 1906 and has them on display in the Main Galleries.
Also within the museum is the Labour History Archive and Study Centre,
which holds the collection of the Labour Party, with material ranging
from 1900 to the present day.
In 1907 the new party held its first annual conference in Belfast, a city in which Hardie in 1905 had served as an LRC election agent for William Walker. Despite Walker's election to the party executive, the connection with the north of Ireland was brief. At the height of the Home Rule Crisis in 1913, the party, in deference to the Irish Labour Party, decided not to stand candidates in Ireland, a policy the party maintained after partition in 1921. Labour was to be a British, not a United Kingdom, party.
The Belfast conference itself was remembered for first raising
the question of whether sovereignty lay with the annual conference, as
in the inherited tradition of trade union democracy, or with the PLP.
Hardie shocked the delegates in the closing session by threatening to
resign from the PLP over an amendment to a resolution on equal suffrage
for women that would have bound MPs to oppose any compromise legislation
that would extend votes to women on the basis of the existing property
franchise. The PLP defused the crisis by allowing Hardie to vote as he
wished on the subject. The precedent became the basis of a "conscience
clause" in its standing orders, and would be invoked by party leader Michael Foot in 1981 to argue that the will of the conference should not always bind the PLP.
The December 1910 general election
saw 42 Labour MPs elected to the House of Commons, a significant
victory since, a year before the election, the House of Lords had passed
the Osborne judgment
ruling that trade union members would have to 'opt in' to sending
contributions to Labour, rather than their consent being presumed. The
governing Liberals were unwilling to repeal this judicial decision with
primary legislation. The height of Liberal compromise was to introduce a
wage for members of Parliament to remove the need to involve the trade
unions. By 1913, faced with the opposition of the largest trade unions,
the Liberal government passed the Trade Disputes Act to allow unions to
fund Labour MPs once more without seeking the express consent of their
members.
During the First World War, the Labour Party split between
supporters and opponents of the conflict; however, opposition to the war
grew within the party as time went on. Ramsay MacDonald, a notable anti-war campaigner, resigned as leader of the Parliamentary Labour Party and Arthur Henderson became the main figure of authority within the party. He was soon accepted into Prime Minister H. H. Asquith's
war cabinet, becoming the first Labour Party member to serve in
government. Despite mainstream Labour Party's support for the coalition
the Independent Labour Party was instrumental in opposing conscription through organisations such as the Non-Conscription Fellowship while a Labour Party affiliate, the British Socialist Party, organised a number of unofficial strikes. Arthur Henderson resigned from the Cabinet in 1917 amid calls for party unity to be replaced by George Barnes. The growth in Labour's local activist base and organisation was reflected in the elections following the war, the co-operative movement now providing its own resources to the Co-operative Party after the armistice. The Co-operative Party later reached an electoral agreement with the Labour Party.
At the end of the First World War, the Government was attempting to provide support for the newly re-established Poland against Soviet Russia.
Henderson sent telegrams to all local Labour Party organisations to ask
them to organise demonstrations against supporting Poland, later
forming the Council of Action, to further organise strikes and protests.
Due to the number of demonstrations and the potential industrial impact
across the country, Churchill and the Government was forced to end
support for the Polish war effort.
Henderson turned his attention to building a strong
constituency-based support network for the Labour Party. Previously, it
had little national organisation, based largely on branches of unions
and socialist societies. Working with Ramsay MacDonald and Sidney Webb,
Henderson established a national network of constituency organisations
in 1918. They operated separately from trade unions and the National
Executive Committee and were open to everyone sympathetic to the party's
policies. Secondly, Henderson secured the adoption of a comprehensive
statement of party policies, as drafted by Sidney Webb.
Entitled "Labour and the New Social Order", it remained the basic
Labour platform until 1950. It proclaimed a socialist party whose
principles included a guaranteed minimum standard of living for
everyone, nationalisation of industry, and heavy taxation of large
incomes and of wealth. It was in 1918 that Clause IV, as drafted by Sidney Webb, was adopted into Labour's constitution, committing the party to work towards "the common ownership of the means of production, distribution and exchange". With the Representation of the People Act 1918,
almost all adult men (excepting only peers, criminals and lunatics) and
most women over the age of thirty were given the right to vote, almost
tripling the British electorate at a stroke, from 7.7 million in 1912 to
21.4 million in 1918. This set the scene for a surge in Labour
representation in parliament. The Communist Party of Great Britain was refused affiliation to the Labour Party between 1921 and 1923.
Meanwhile, the Liberal Party
declined rapidly, and the party also suffered a catastrophic split
which allowed the Labour Party to gain much of the Liberals' support. With the Liberals thus in disarray, Labour won 142 seats in 1922, making it the second-largest political group in the House of Commons and the official opposition to the Conservative government. After the election Ramsay MacDonald was voted the first official leader of the Labour Party.
First Labour government and period in opposition (1923–1929)
Ramsay MacDonald, first Labour prime minister (1924 and 1929–1931).
The 1923 general election was fought on the Conservatives' protectionist
proposals, but although they got the most votes and remained the
largest party, they lost their majority in parliament, necessitating the
formation of a government supporting free trade. Thus, with the acquiescence of Asquith's Liberals, Ramsay MacDonald
became the first ever Labour Prime Minister in January 1924, forming
the first Labour government, despite Labour only having 191 MPs (less
than a third of the House of Commons). The most significant achievement
of the first Labour government was the Wheatley Housing Act, which began a building programme of 500,000 municipal houses
for rental to low paid workers. Legislation on education, unemployment,
social insurance and tenant protection was also passed. However,
because the government had to rely on the support of the Liberals it was
unable to implement many of its more contentious policies such as nationalisation of the coal industry, or a capital levy. Although no radical changes were introduced, Labour demonstrated that they were capable of governing.
While there were no major labour strikes during his term,
MacDonald acted swiftly to end those that did erupt. When the Labour
Party executive criticised the government, he replied that, "public
doles, Poplarism
local defiance of the national government, strikes for increased wages,
limitation of output, not only are not Socialism, but may mislead the
spirit and policy of the Socialist movement."
The government collapsed after only ten months when the Liberals voted for a Select Committee inquiry into the Campbell Case, a vote which MacDonald had declared to be a vote of confidence. The ensuing 1924 general election saw the publication, four days before polling day, of the forged Zinoviev letter,
in which Moscow talked about a Communist revolution in Britain. The
letter had little impact on the Labour vote—which held up. It was the
collapse of the Liberal party that led to the Conservative landslide.
The Conservatives were returned to power although Labour increased its
vote from 30.7% to a third of the popular vote, most Conservative gains
being at the expense of the Liberals. However, many Labourites blamed
for years their defeat on foul play (the Zinoviev letter), thereby
according to A. J. P. Taylor misunderstanding the political forces at work and delaying needed reforms in the party.
In opposition, MacDonald continued his policy of presenting the Labour Party as a moderate force. The party opposed the 1926 general strike,
arguing that the best way to achieve social reforms was through the
ballot box. The leaders were also fearful of Communist influence
orchestrated from Moscow.
The party had a distinctive and suspicious foreign policy based on
pacifism. Its leaders believed that peace was impossible because of
capitalism, secret diplomacy, and the trade in armaments. That is it
stressed material factors that ignored the psychological memories of the
Great War, and the highly emotional tensions regarding nationalism and
the boundaries of the countries.
In the 1929 general election,
the Labour Party became the largest in the House of Commons for the
first time, with 287 seats and 37.1% of the popular vote. However
MacDonald was still reliant on Liberal support to form a minority
government. MacDonald went on to appoint Britain's first woman cabinet
minister; Margaret Bondfield, who was appointed Minister of Labour.
MacDonald's second government was in a stronger parliamentary position
than his first, and in 1930 Labour was able to pass legislation to raise
unemployment pay, improve wages and conditions in the coal industry
(i.e. the issues behind the General Strike) and pass a housing act which
focused on slum clearances.
The government soon found itself engulfed in crisis as the Wall Street Crash of 1929 and eventual Great Depression
occurred soon after the government came to power, and the slump in
global trade hit Britain hard. By the end of 1930 unemployment had
doubled to over two and a half million.
The government had no effective answers to the deteriorating financial
situation, and by 1931 there was much fear that the budget was
unbalanced, which was born out by the independent May Report
which triggered a confidence crisis and a run on the pound. The cabinet
deadlocked over its response, with several influential members
unwilling to support the budget cuts (in particular a cut in the rate of
unemployment benefit) which were pressed by the civil service and
opposition parties. Chancellor of the ExchequerPhilip Snowden refused to consider deficit spending
or tariffs as alternative solutions. When a final vote was taken, the
Cabinet was split 11–9 with a minority, including many political
heavyweights such as Arthur Henderson and George Lansbury,
threatening to resign rather than agree to the cuts. The unworkable
split, on 24 August 1931, made the government resign. MacDonald was
encouraged by King George V to form an all-party National Government to deal with the immediate crisis.
The financial crisis grew worse, and decisive government action
was needed, as the leaders of both the Conservative Party and the
Liberal Party met with King George V and MacDonald, at first to discuss
support for the spending cuts but later to discuss the shape of the next
government. The king played the central role in demanding a National
government be formed. On 24 August, MacDonald agreed to form a National
Government composed of men from all parties with the specific aim of
balancing the Budget and restoring confidence. The new cabinet had four
Labourites (who formed a National Labour
group) who stood with MacDonald, plus four Conservatives (led by
Baldwin, Chamberlain) and two Liberals. MacDonald's moves aroused great
anger among a large majority of Labour Party activists who felt
betrayed. Labour unions were strongly opposed and the Labour Party
officially repudiated the new National government. It expelled MacDonald
and his supporters and made Henderson the leader of the main Labour
party. Henderson led it into the general election
on 27 October against the three-party National coalition. It was a
disaster for Labour, which was reduced to a small minority of 52 seats.
The Conservative-dominated National Government, led by MacDonald, won
the largest landslide in British political history.
In 1931, Labour campaigned on opposition to public spending cuts,
but found it difficult to defend the record of the party's former
government and the fact that most of the cuts had been agreed before it
fell. Historian Andrew Thorpe argues that Labour lost credibility by
1931 as unemployment soared, especially in coal, textiles, shipbuilding,
and steel. The working class increasingly lost confidence in the
ability of Labour to solve the most pressing problem.
The 2.5 million Irish Catholics in England and Scotland were a major
factor in the Labour base in many industrial areas. The Catholic Church
had previously tolerated the Labour Party, and denied that it
represented true socialism. However, the bishops by 1930 had grown
increasingly alarmed at Labour's policies toward Communist Russia,
toward birth control and especially toward funding Catholic schools. The
Catholic shift against Labour and in favour of the National government
played a major role in Labour's losses.
Labour in opposition (1931–1940)
Arthur Henderson, elected in 1931 to succeed MacDonald, lost his seat in the 1931 general election. The only former Labour cabinet member who had retained his seat, the pacifist George Lansbury, accordingly became party leader.
The party experienced another split in 1932 when the Independent Labour Party,
which for some years had been increasingly at odds with the Labour
leadership, opted to disaffiliate from the Labour Party and embarked on a
long, drawn-out decline.
Lansbury resigned as leader in 1935 after public disagreements over foreign policy. As of 2023, he is the only Labour leader to stand down from the role without contesting a general election (excluding acting leaders).[a] He was promptly replaced as leader by his deputy, Clement Attlee, who would lead the party for two decades. The party experienced a revival in the 1935 general election, winning 154 seats and 38% of the popular vote, the highest that Labour had achieved.
As the threat from Nazi Germany
increased, in the late 1930s the Labour Party gradually abandoned its
pacifist stance and came to support re-armament, largely due to the
efforts of Ernest Bevin and Hugh Dalton, who by 1937 had also persuaded the party to oppose Neville Chamberlain's policy of appeasement.
The party returned to government in 1940 as part of the wartime coalition. When Neville Chamberlain resigned in the spring of 1940, incoming Prime MinisterWinston Churchill decided to bring the other main parties into a coalition similar to that of the First World War. Clement Attlee was appointed Lord Privy Seal and a member of the war cabinet, eventually becoming the United Kingdom's first Deputy Prime Minister.
At the end of the war in Europe, in May 1945, Labour resolved not to
repeat the Liberals' error of 1918, promptly withdrawing from
government, on trade union insistence, to contest the 1945 general election in opposition to Churchill's Conservatives. Surprising many observers, Labour won a landslide victory, winning just under 50% of the vote with a majority of 159 seats.
Attlee's government proved one of the most radical British governments of the 20th century, enacting Keynesian economic policies, presiding over a policy of nationalising major industries and utilities including the Bank of England,
coal mining, the steel industry, electricity, gas, and inland transport
(including railways, road haulage and canals). It developed and
implemented the "cradle to grave" welfare state conceived by the economist William Beveridge.To this day, most people in the United Kingdom see the 1948 creation of Britain's National Health Service (NHS) under health minister Aneurin Bevan, which gave publicly funded medical treatment for all, as Labour's proudest achievement. Attlee's government also began the process of dismantling the British Empire
when it granted independence to India and Pakistan in 1947, followed by
Burma (Myanmar) and Ceylon (Sri Lanka) the following year. At a secret
meeting in January 1947, Attlee and six cabinet ministers, including
Foreign Secretary Ernest Bevin, decided to proceed with the development of Britain's nuclear weapons programme, in opposition to the pacifist and anti-nuclear stances of a large element inside the Labour Party.
Labour went on to win the 1950 general election,
but with a much-reduced majority of five seats. Soon afterwards,
defence became a divisive issue within the party, especially defence
spending (which reached a peak of 14% of GDP in 1951 during the Korean War), straining public finances and forcing savings elsewhere. The Chancellor of the Exchequer, Hugh Gaitskell, introduced charges for NHS dentures and spectacles, causing Bevan, along with Harold Wilson
(then President of the Board of Trade), to resign over the dilution of
the principle of free treatment on which the NHS had been established.
In the 1951 general election,
Labour narrowly lost to Churchill's Conservatives, despite receiving
the larger share of the popular vote – its highest ever vote
numerically. Most of the changes introduced by the 1945–51 Labour
government were accepted by the Conservatives and became part of the "post-war consensus"
that lasted until the late 1970s. Food and clothing rationing, however,
still in place since the war, were swiftly relaxed, then abandoned from
about 1953.
Post-war consensus (1951–1964)
Following the defeat of 1951, the party spent 13 years in opposition.
The party suffered an ideological split, between the party's left-wing
followers of Aneurin Bevan (known as Bevanites) and the right-wing of the party following Hugh Gaitskell (known as Gaitskellites)
while the postwar economic recovery and the social effects of Attlee's
reforms made the public broadly content with the Conservative
governments of the time. The ageing Attlee contested his final general
election in 1955, which saw Labour lose ground, and he retired shortly after.
Under his replacement, Hugh Gaitskell, Labour appeared more united than before and had been widely expected to win the 1959 general election, but did not. Following this internal party infighting resumed, particularly over the issues of nuclear disarmament, Britain's entry into the European Economic Community (EEC) and Clause IV of the Labour Party Constitution, which was viewed as Labour's commitment to nationalisation which Gaitskell wanted scrapped. These issues would continue to divide the party for decades to come.
Gaitskell died suddenly in 1963, and this made way for Harold Wilson to lead the party.
Harold Wilson, Prime Minister (1964–1970 and 1974–1976).
A downturn in the economy and a series of scandals in the early 1960s (the most notorious being the Profumo affair) had engulfed the Conservative government by 1963. The Labour Party returned to government with a 4-seat majority under Wilson in the 1964 general election but increased its majority to 96 in the 1966 general election.
Wilson's government was responsible for a number of sweeping social and educational reforms under the leadership of Home SecretaryRoy Jenkins such as the abolishment of the death penalty in 1965, the legalisation of abortion and homosexuality (initially only for men aged 21 or over, and only in England and Wales) in 1967 and the abolition of theatre censorship in 1968. Wilson's government also put heavy emphasis on expanding opportunities through education, and as such, comprehensive education was expanded and the Open University created.
Wilson's first period as Prime Minister coincided with a period
of relatively low unemployment and economic prosperity, it was however
hindered by significant problems with a large trade deficit which it had
inherited from the previous government. The first three years of the
government were spent in an ultimately doomed attempt to stave off the
continued devaluation of the pound. Labour went on to unexpectedly lose
the 1970 general election to the Conservatives under Edward Heath.
Spell in opposition (1970–1974)
After losing the 1970 general election, Labour returned to
opposition, but retained Harold Wilson as Leader. Heath's government
soon ran into trouble over Northern Ireland and a dispute with miners in 1973 which led to the "three-day week". The 1970s proved a difficult time to be in government for both the Conservatives and Labour due to the 1973 oil crisis, which caused high inflation and a global recession.
The Labour Party was returned to power again under Wilson a few days after the February 1974 general election, forming a minority government with the support of the Ulster Unionists.
The Conservatives were unable to form a government alone, as they had
fewer seats despite receiving more votes numerically. It was the first
general election since 1924 in which both main parties had received less
than 40% of the popular vote and the first of six successive general
elections in which Labour failed to reach 40% of the popular vote. In a bid to gain a majority, a second election was soon called for October 1974
in which Labour, still with Harold Wilson as leader, won a slim
majority of three, gaining just 18 seats taking its total to 319.
For much of its time in office the Labour government struggled with
serious economic problems and a precarious majority in the Commons,
while the party's internal dissent over Britain's membership of the European Economic Community, which Britain had entered under Edward Heath in 1972, led in 1975 to a national referendum
on the issue in which two thirds of the public supported continued
membership. Harold Wilson's personal popularity remained reasonably high
but he unexpectedly resigned as Prime Minister in 1976 citing health
reasons, and was replaced by James Callaghan. The Wilson and Callaghan governments of the 1970s tried to control inflation (which reached 23.7% in 1975) by a policy of wage restraint. This was fairly successful, reducing inflation to 7.4% by 1978. However it led to increasingly strained relations between the government and the trade unions.
Fear of advances by the nationalist parties, particularly in Scotland, led to the suppression of a report from Scottish Office economist Gavin McCrone that suggested that an independent Scotland would be "chronically in surplus". By 1977 by-election losses and defections to the breakaway Scottish Labour Party
left Callaghan heading a minority government, forced to do deals with
smaller parties in order to govern. An arrangement negotiated in 1977
with Liberal leader David Steel, known as the Lib–Lab pact, ended after one year. Deals were then forged with various small parties including the Scottish National Party (SNP) and the Welsh nationalist Plaid Cymru, prolonging the life of the government.
The nationalist parties, in turn, demanded devolution
to their respective constituent countries in return for their
supporting the government. When referendums for Scottish and Welsh
devolution were held in March 1979 the Welsh devolution referendum saw a large majority vote against, while the Scottish referendum
returned a narrow majority in favour without reaching the required
threshold of 40% support. When the Labour government duly refused to
push ahead with setting up the proposed Scottish Assembly, the SNP
withdrew its support for the government: this finally brought the
government down as the Conservatives triggered a vote of confidence in Callaghan's government that was lost by a single vote on 28 March 1979, necessitating a general election.
By 1978, the economy had started to show signs of recovery, with
inflation falling to single digits, unemployment falling, and living
standards starting to rise during the year. Labour's opinion poll ratings also improved, with most showing the party to be in the lead.
Callaghan had been widely expected to call a general election in the
autumn of 1978 to take advantage of the improving situation. In the
event, he decided to gamble that extending the wage restraint policy for
another year would allow the economy to be in better shape for a 1979
election. However this proved unpopular with the trade unions, and
during the winter of 1978–79 there were widespread strikes among lorry
drivers, railway workers, car workers and local government and hospital
workers in favour of higher pay-rises that caused significant disruption
to everyday life. These events came to be dubbed the "Winter of Discontent".
These industrial disputes sent the Conservatives now led by Margaret Thatcher into the lead in the polls, which led to Labour's defeat in the 1979 general election.
The Labour vote held up in the election, with the party receiving
nearly the same number of votes than in 1974. However, the Conservative
Party achieved big increases in support in the Midlands and South of
England, benefiting from both a surge in turnout and votes lost by the
ailing Liberals.
The Labour Party was defeated heavily in the 1983 general election, winning only 27.6% of the vote, its lowest share since 1918, and receiving only half a million votes more than the SDP-Liberal Alliance,
which leader Michael Foot condemned for "siphoning" Labour support and
enabling the Conservatives to greatly increase their majority of
parliamentary seats. The party manifesto for this election was termed by critics as "the longest suicide note in history".
Neil Kinnock, Leader of the Opposition (1983–1992).The Labour Party logo under the Foot leadership.
Foot resigned and was replaced as leader by Neil Kinnock, with Roy Hattersley as his deputy. The new leadership progressively dropped unpopular policies. The miners' strike of 1984–85 over coal mine closures, which divided the National Union of Mineworkers (NUM) as well as the Labour Party, and the Wapping dispute led to clashes with the left of the party, and negative coverage in most of the press.
The alliances which campaigns such as Lesbians and Gays Support the Miners forged between lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) and labour groups, as well as the Labour Party itself, also proved to be an important turning point in the progression of LGBT issues in the UK.
At the 1985 Labour Party conference in Bournemouth, a resolution
committing the party to support LGBT equality rights passed for the
first time with block voting support from the NUM.
Labour improved its performance in 1987,
gaining 20 seats and so reducing the Conservative majority from 143 to
102. They were now firmly re-established as the second political party
in Britain as the Alliance had once again failed to make a breakthrough
with seats. A merger of the SDP and Liberals formed the Liberal Democrats.
Following the 1987 election, the National Executive Committee resumed
disciplinary action against members of Militant, who remained in the
party, leading to further expulsions of their activists and the two MPs
who supported the group. During the 1980s radically socialist members of
the party were often described as the "loony left", particularly in the print media. The print media in the 1980s also began using the pejorative "hard left" to sometimes describe Trotskyist groups such as the Militant tendency, Socialist Organiser and Socialist Action. In 1988, Kinnock was challenged by Tony Benn
for the party leadership. Based on the percentages, 183 members of
parliament supported Kinnock, while Benn was backed by 37. With a clear
majority, Kinnock remained leader of the Labour Party.
The Labour Party logo under Kinnock, Smith and Blair's leaderships.
In November 1990 following a contested leadership election, Margaret Thatcher resigned as leader of the Conservative Party and was succeeded as leader and Prime Minister by John Major.
Most opinion polls had shown Labour comfortably ahead of the Tories for
more than a year before Thatcher's resignation, with the fall in Tory
support blamed largely on her introduction of the unpopular poll tax, combined with the fact that the economy was sliding into recession
at the time. The change of leader in the Tory government saw a
turnaround in support for the Tories, who regularly topped the opinion
polls throughout 1991 although Labour regained the lead more than once.
The "yo-yo" in the opinion polls continued into 1992, though
after November 1990 any Labour lead in the polls was rarely sufficient
for a majority. Major resisted Kinnock's calls for a general election
throughout 1991. Kinnock campaigned on the theme "It's Time for a
Change", urging voters to elect a new government after more than a
decade of unbroken Conservative rule. However, the Conservatives
themselves had undergone a change of leader from Thatcher to Major and
replaced the Community Charge.
The 1992 general election
was widely tipped to result in a hung parliament or a narrow Labour
majority, but in the event, the Conservatives were returned to power,
though with a much-reduced majority of 21.
Despite the increased number of seats and votes, it was a disappointing
result for the Labour party. For the first time in over 30 years there
was serious doubt among the public and the media as to whether Labour
could ever return to government.
Kinnock then resigned as leader and was succeeded by John Smith.
Once again the battle erupted between the old guard on the party's left
and those identified as "modernisers". The old guard argued that trends
showed they were regaining strength under Smith's strong leadership.
Meanwhile, the breakaway SDP merged with the Liberal Party. The new Liberal Democrats seemed to pose a major threat to the Labour base. Tony Blair
(the Shadow Home Secretary) had a different vision to traditional
Labour politics. Blair, the leader of the "modernising" faction, argued
that the long-term trends had to be reversed, arguing that the party was
too locked into a base that was shrinking, since it was based on the
working-class, on trade unions, and on residents of subsidised council
housing. Blair argued that the rapidly growing middle class was largely
ignored, as well as more ambitious working-class families. Blair said
that they aspired to become middle-class and accepted the Conservative
argument that traditional Labour was holding ambitious people back to
some extent with higher tax policies. To present a fresh face and new
policies to the electorate, New Labour needed more than fresh leaders; it had to jettison outdated policies, argued the modernisers. The first step was procedural, but essential. Calling on the slogan, "One Member, One Vote" Blair (with some help from Smith) defeated the union element and ended block voting by leaders of labour unions.
Blair and the modernisers called for radical adjustment of Party goals
by repealing "Clause IV", the historic commitment to nationalisation of
industry. This was achieved in 1995.
Black Wednesday
in September 1992 damaged the Conservative government's reputation for
economic competence, and by the end of that year, Labour had a
comfortable lead over the Tories in the opinion polls. Although the
recession was declared over in April 1993 and a period of strong and
sustained economic growth followed, coupled with a relatively swift fall
in unemployment, the Labour lead in the opinion polls remained strong.
However, Smith died from a heart attack in May 1994. As of 2023,
he is the last Labour leader not to have contested a general election
(excluding acting leaders and the incumbent, whose tenure is ongoing).
Tony Blair continued to move the party further to the centre, abandoning the largely symbolic Clause Four at the 1995 mini-conference in a strategy to increase the party's appeal to "middle England". More than a simple re-branding, however, the project would draw upon the Third Way strategy, informed by the thoughts of the British sociologist Anthony Giddens.
New Labour
was first termed as an alternative branding for the Labour Party,
dating from a conference slogan first used by the Labour Party in 1994,
which was later seen in a draft manifesto published by the party in
1996, called New Labour, New Life For Britain. It was a continuation of the trend that had begun under the leadership of Neil Kinnock.
New Labour as a name has no official status, but remains in common use
to distinguish modernisers from those holding to more traditional
positions, normally referred to as "Old Labour".
New Labour is a party of ideas and
ideals but not of outdated ideology. What counts is what works. The
objectives are radical. The means will be modern.
The Labour Party won the 1997 general election
in a landslide victory with a parliamentary majority of 179; it was the
largest ever Labour majority, and at the time the largest swing to a
political party achieved since 1945. Over the next decade, a wide range of progressive social reforms were enacted,with millions lifted out of poverty during Labour's time in office largely as a result of various tax and benefit reforms.
New Labour logo.
Among the early acts of Blair's government were the establishment of the national minimum wage, the devolution of power to Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, major changes to the regulation of the banking system, and the re-creation of a citywide government body for London, the Greater London Authority, with its own elected-Mayor. Combined with a Conservative opposition that had yet to organise effectively under William Hague, and the continuing popularity of Blair, Labour went on to win the 2001 election with a similar majority, dubbed the "quiet landslide" by the media. In 2003 Labour introduced tax credits,
government top-ups to the pay of low-wage workers. A perceived turning
point was when Blair controversially allied himself with US President George W. Bush in supporting the Iraq War, which caused him to lose much of his political support. The UN Secretary-General, among many, considered the war illegal and a violation of the UN Charter. The Iraq War was deeply unpopular in most western countries, with Western governments divided in their support and under pressure from worldwide popular protests. The decisions that led up to the Iraq war and its subsequent conduct were the subject of Sir John Chilcot's Iraq Inquiry (commonly referred to as the "Chilcot report").
In the 2005 general election,
Labour was re-elected for a third term, but with a reduced majority of
66 and popular vote of only 35.2%, the lowest percentage of any majority
government in British history. During this election, proposed controversial posters by Alastair Campbell
where opposition leader Michael Howard and shadow chancellor Oliver
Letwin, who are both Jewish, were depicted as flying pigs were
criticised as being anti-Semitic.
The posters were referring to the expression 'when pigs fly', to
suggest that Tory election promises were unrealistic. In response,
Campbell said that the posters were not in "any way shape or form"
intended to be anti-Semitic.
Blair announced in September 2006 that he would quit as leader within
the year, though he had been under pressure to quit earlier than May
2007 in order to get a new leader in place before the May elections
which were expected to be disastrous for Labour. In the event, the party did lose power in Scotland to a minority Scottish National Party government at the 2007 elections and, shortly after this, Blair resigned as Prime Minister and was replaced by the Chancellor, Gordon Brown.
Although the party experienced a brief rise in the polls after this,
its popularity soon slumped to its lowest level since the days of Michael Foot. During May 2008, Labour suffered heavy defeats in the London mayoral election, local elections and the loss in the Crewe and Nantwich by-election,
culminating in the party registering its worst ever opinion poll result
since records began in 1943, of 23%, with many citing Brown's
leadership as a key factor. Brown coordinated the UK's response to the 2007–2008 financial crisis.
Membership of the party also reached a low ebb, falling to 156,205 by
the end of 2009: over 40 per cent of the 405,000 peak reached in 1997
and thought to be the lowest total since the party was founded.
Finance proved a major problem for the Labour Party during this period; a "cash for peerages"
scandal under Blair resulted in the drying up of many major sources of
donations. Between January and March 2008, the Labour Party received
just over £3 million in donations and were £17 million in debt, compared
to the Conservatives' £6 million in donations and £12 million in debt. These debts eventually mounted to £24.5 million, and were finally fully repaid in 2015.
In the 2010 general election on 6 May that year, Labour with 29.0% of the vote won the second largest number of seats (258). The Conservatives with 36.5% of the vote won the largest number of seats (307), but no party had an overall majority, meaning that Labour could still remain in power if they managed to form a coalition with at least one smaller party.
However, the Labour Party would have had to form a coalition with more
than one other smaller party to gain an overall majority; anything less
would result in a minority government. On 10 May 2010, after talks to form a coalition with the Liberal Democrats broke down, Brown announced his intention to stand down as Leader before the Labour Party Conference but a day later resigned as both Prime Minister and party leader.
Opposition and internal conflict (2010–present)
Ed Miliband era (2010–2015)
Ed Miliband, Leader of the Opposition (2010–2015).
The party's performance held up in the 2012 local elections, with Labour consolidating its position in the North and Midlands while also regaining some ground in Southern England. In Wales the party enjoyed good successes, regaining control of most Welsh councils lost in 2008, including Cardiff. In Scotland, Labour enjoyed a +3.26 swing. Results in London were mixed as Ken Livingstone lost the election for Mayor of London, but the party gained its highest ever representation in the Greater London Authority in the concurrent assembly election.
In March 2014, the party reformed internal election procedures, including replacing the electoral college system with "one member, one vote". Mass membership was encouraged by creating a class of "registered supporters" as an alternative to full membership. Trade union members would also have to explicitly opt in rather than opt out of paying a political levy to the party.
The party won 20 seats in the 2014 European parliamentary election, to the UK Independence Party's 24 and the Conservatives' 19. Labour also gained 324 councillors in the 2014 local elections. In September 2014, Labour outlined plans to cut the government's current account deficit and balance the budget by 2020, excluding investment. The party carried these plans into the 2015 general election, which Labour lost. Its representation fell to 232 seats in the House of Commons. The party lost 40 of its 41 seats in Scotland to the Scottish National Party. Although Labour gained more than 20 seats in England and Wales, it lost more seats to the Conservatives, for net losses overall.
Jeremy Corbyn, Leader of the Opposition (2015–2020).
After the 2015 general election, Miliband resigned as party leader and Harriet Harman again became interim leader. Labour held a leadership election in which Jeremy Corbyn, then a member of the Socialist Campaign Group,
was considered a fringe candidate when the contest began, receiving
nominations from just 36 MPs, one more than the minimum required to
stand, and the support of just 16 MPs.
The Labour Party saw a flood of membership applications during the
leadership election, with most of the new members thought to be Corbyn
supporters. Corbyn was elected leader with 60% of the vote. Membership continued to climb after his victory; one year later it had grown to more than 500,000, making it the largest political party in Western Europe.
Brexit referendum
Tensions soon developed in the parliamentary party over Corbyn's leadership, particularly after the 2016 Brexit referendum. Many in the party were angered that Corbyn did not campaign strongly against Brexit; he had been only a "lukewarm" supporter of remaining in the European Union and refused to join David Cameron in campaigning for the Remain side. 21 members of the Shadow Cabinet resigned after the referendum. Corbyn lost a no-confidence vote among Labour MPs by 172–40, triggering a leadership election, which he won decisively with 62% support among Labour party members. The following year in 2017, the party faced further chaos when its leadership decided to support the European Union Notification of Withdrawal Bill,
which formally declared the UK's intention to leave the European Union.
47 of 229 Labour MPs voted against the bill in defiance of the party's three-line whip. Unusually, the rebel frontbenchers did not face immediate dismissal.
In 2018, following pressure from members to call for a referendum on
the Brexit deal, Corbyn said that while he opposed the idea, he would
abide by the decision of members at the 2018 party conference. The party conference adopted a compromise wording, saying that the party should "keep the option open.
2017 general election
In April 2017, Prime Minister Theresa May called a snap election for June 2017.
Corbyn resisted pressure from within the Labour Party to call for a
referendum on the eventual Brexit deal, instead focusing on health care,
education and ending austerity.
Although Labour started the campaign as far as 20 points behind, it
defied expectations by gaining 40% of the vote, its greatest share since
2001 and the biggest increase in vote share in a single general election since 1945. The party gained a net 30 seats.
From 2016, the Labour Party has faced criticism for failing to deal with antisemitism. Criticism was also levelled at Corbyn. The Chakrabarti Inquiry cleared the party of widespread antisemitism but identified an "occasionally toxic atmosphere". High-profile party members, including Ken Livingstone, Peter Willsman and Chris Williamson,
left the party or were suspended over antisemitism-related incidents.
In 2018, internal divisions emerged over adopting the IHRA Working Definition of Antisemitism, with 68 rabbis criticising the leadership. The issue was cited by a number of MPs who left the party to set up Change UK. During the 2019 general election, Chief Rabbi Ephraim Mirvis accused Labour of tolerating antisemitism "sanctioned from the top." An investigation by the Equalities and Human Rights Commission
found the party responsible for three Equality Act breaches, including
harassment political interference in antisemitism complaints.
2019 general election
A week after seven Labour MPs left the party in February 2019 to form The Independent Group (later rebranded as Change UK,
partly in protest over Labour's Brexit position, the Labour leadership
said it would support another referendum "as a final resort in order to
stop a damaging Tory Brexit being forced on the country".
During the 2019 general election,
Labour campaigned on a manifesto widely considered the most radical in
decades, more closely resembling Labour's politics of the 1970s than
subsequent decades. These included plans to nationalise the country's
biggest energy firms, the National Grid, the water industry, Royal Mail,
the railways and the broadband arm of BT. Labour's spending plans were endorsed by more than 160 economists and academics and characterised as a "serious programme" to deal with internal problems.
The election saw Labour win its lowest number of seats since 1935.
In a post-election review featuring Labour MPs, trade union officials
and activists one of several reasons attributed to the electoral defeat
was due to the declining popularity of Jeremy Corbyn in relation to the
Brexit position and allegations of party antisemitism. The review
projected that Labour would have retained 38% of the vote had Corbyn’s
popularity levels retained at its peak level in 2017.
Keir Starmer, Leader of the Opposition (2020–present).
Following Labour's defeat in the 2019 general election, Jeremy Corbyn announced that he would stand down as Leader of the Labour Party. On 4 April 2020, Keir Starmer was elected as Leader of the Labour Party amidst the COVID-19 pandemic.
One of Starmer's early priorities was dealing with accusations of systemic antisemitism within the Labour Party. In 2020, the Equalities and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) found the Labour Party guilty of three breaches of the Equality Act. The party temporarily suspended former leader Jeremy Corbyn after he stated that "the scale of the problem was also dramatically overstated for political reasons". The party reinstated his membership, but in 2023 barred him from seeking office again as a Labour candidate. In February 2023, the party's antisemitism reforms resulted in the party no longer being monitored by the EHRC.
Starmer's tenure has seen the party move closer towards the political centre.
Starmer has faced claims that he has carried out a purge against
potential left-wing candidates and by suspending 2 left-wing MPs amidst
this move towards the centre. He has been accused by some of being authoritarian during his leadership of the Labour Party, by not committing to overturn the Conservative Party's anti-protest bill
and via intolerance for dissent within the Labour Party; the latter of
which has also been described as "anti-democratic and above all
illiberal".
Since the end of 2021, Labour have maintained a poll lead over the
Conservatives, including the highest poll lead of any party in over 20
years amid the government crisis during the Premiership of Liz Truss.
Ideology
In 2015, Labour was considered to be a centre-left party. It was formed to provide political representation for the trade union movement at Westminster. The Labour Party gained a socialist commitment with the party constitution of 1918, Clause IV of which called for the "common ownership", or nationalisation,
of the "means of production, distribution and exchange". Although about
a third of British industry was taken into public ownership after the
Second World War and remained so until the 1980s, the right of the party
were questioning the validity of expanding on this by the late 1950s.
Influenced by Anthony Crosland's book The Future of Socialism (1956), the circle around party leader Hugh Gaitskell felt that the commitment was no longer necessary. An attempt to remove Clause IV from the party constitution in 1959 failed, Tony Blair and New Labour "modernisers" were successful in doing so 35 years later.
Historically influenced by Keynesian economics, the party favoured government intervention in the economy, and the redistribution
of wealth. Taxation was seen as a means to achieve a "major
redistribution of wealth and income" in the October 1974 election
manifesto. The party also desired increased rights for workers, and a welfare state including publicly funded healthcare. From the late-1980s onwards, the party adopted free market policies, leading many observers to describe the Labour Party as social democratic or the Third Way, rather than democratic socialist.
Other commentators go further and argue that traditional social
democratic parties across Europe, including the British Labour Party,
have been so deeply transformed in recent years that it is no longer
possible to describe them ideologically as "social democratic", and that this ideological shift has put new strains on the Labour Party's traditional relationship with the trade unions. Within the party, differentiation was made between the social democratic and the socialist wings of the party, the latter often subscribed to a radical socialist, even Marxist, ideology.
While affirming a commitment to democratic socialism,
the new version of Clause IV no longer definitely commits the party to
public ownership of industry and in its place advocates "the enterprise
of the market and the rigour of competition" along with "high quality
public services [...] either owned by the public or accountable to
them". MPs in the Socialist Campaign Group and the Labour Representation Committee
see themselves as standard bearers for the radical socialist tradition
in contrast to the democratic socialist tradition represented by
organisations such as Compass and the magazine Tribune. The group Progress, founded in 1996, represents the centrist position in the party and was opposed to the Corbyn leadership. In 2015, Momentum was created by Jon Lansman as a grass-roots left-wing organisation following Jeremy Corbyn's election as party leader. Rather than organising among the PLP, Momentum is a rank and file grouping with an estimated 40,000 members. The party also has a Christian socialist faction, the Christians on the Left society.
Symbols
Labour has long been identified with red, a political colour traditionally affiliated with socialism and the labour movement.
Prior to the red flag logo, the party had used a modified version of
the classic 1924 shovel, torch, and quill emblem. In 1924 a brand
conscious Labour leadership had devised a competition, inviting
supporters to design a logo to replace the 'polo mint' like motif that
had previously appeared on party literature. The winning entry,
emblazoned with the word "Liberty" over a design incorporating a torch,
shovel and quill symbol, was popularised through its sale, in badge
form, for a shilling. The party conference in 1931 passed a motion "That
this conference adopts Party Colours, which should be uniform
throughout the country, colours to be red and gold".
During the New Labour period, the colour purple was also used, and the
party has used other colours in certain areas according to local
tradition.
The red flag, originally the official flag and symbol of the Labour Party.
Since the party's inception, the red flag has been Labour's official symbol; the flag has been associated with socialism and revolution ever since the 1789 French Revolution and the revolutions of 1848. The red rose,
a symbol of socialism and social democracy, was adopted as the party
symbol in 1986 as part of a rebranding exercise and is now incorporated
into the party logo.
The red flag became an inspiration which resulted in the composition of "The Red Flag",
the official party anthem since its inception, being sung at the end of
party conferences and on various occasions such as in Parliament in
February 2006 to mark the centenary of the Labour Party's founding. It
still remains in use, although attempts were made to play down the role
of the song during New Labour. The song "Jerusalem", based on a William Blake poem, is also traditionally sung at the end of party conferences with The Red Flag.
The Labour Party is a democratic socialist
party. It believes that by the strength of our common endeavour we
achieve more than we achieve alone, so as to create for each of us the
means to realise our true potential and for all of us a community in
which power, wealth and opportunity are in the hands of the many, not
the few, where the rights we enjoy reflect the duties we owe, and where
we live together, freely, in a spirit of solidarity, tolerance and
respect.
The party's decision-making bodies on a national level formally include the National Executive Committee (NEC), Labour Party Conference and National Policy Forum
(NPF)—although in practice the Parliamentary leadership has the final
say on policy. The 2008 Labour Party Conference was the first at which
affiliated trade unions and Constituency Labour Parties did not have the
right to submit motions on contemporary issues that would previously
have been debated.
Labour Party conferences now include more "keynote" addresses, guest
speakers and question-and-answer sessions, while specific discussion of
policy now takes place in the National Policy Forum.
A graph showing Labour Party individual membership, excluding affiliated members and supporters.
As of 31 December 2010, under Leader Ed Miliband, individual membership of the party was 193,261; a historical low for the Party since the 1930s. Membership remained relatively unchanged in the following years. In August 2015, prior to the 2015 leadership election, the Labour Party reported 292,505 full members, 147,134 affiliated supporters (mostly from affiliated trade unions and socialist societies) and 110,827 registered supporters; a total of about 550,000 members and supporters.
Following the election of Jeremy Corbyn as leader, individual membership almost doubled to 388,262 in December 2015; and rose significantly again the following year to 543,645 in December 2016.
As of December 2017, the party had 564,443 full members, a peak since 1980 making it the largest political party in Western Europe.
Consequently, membership fees became the largest component of the
party's income, overtaking trade unions donations which were previously
of most financial importance, making Labour the most financially
well-off British political party in 2017.[245] As of December 2019, the party had 532,046 full members.
In the 2020 leadership election
490,731 people voted, of which 401,564 (81.8%) were members, 76,161
(15.5%) had affiliated membership and 13,006 (2.6%) were registered
supporters. The registered supporter class was abolished in 2021. By July 2023, the party's membership was reported to have fallen to 399,195 members. In March 2024, it was reported that the Labour Party's membership had fallen to 366,604.
Northern Ireland
For many years, Labour held to a policy of not allowing residents of Northern Ireland to apply for membership, instead supporting the Social Democratic and Labour Party (SDLP) which informally takes the Labour whip in the House of Commons.
The 2003 Labour Party Conference accepted legal advice that the party
could not continue to prohibit residents of the province joining,
and whilst the National Executive has established a regional
constituency party it has not yet agreed to contest elections there. In
December 2015 a meeting of the members of the Labour Party in Northern
Ireland decided unanimously to contest the elections for the Northern Ireland Assembly held in May 2016. The Labour Party in Northern Ireland moved a model motion, in July 2020, for Labour's NEC to allow them a "Right to Stand". The motion noted how the SDLP's alliance with Fianna Fáil, a member-party of the Liberal International in the Republic of Ireland, had meant that it was campaigning against the Irish Labour Party, which it saw as questioning "the legitimacy of Labour's sister party relationship".
Unite the Union showing their support for the Labour party on their Leeds offices during the 2015 general election.
The Trade Union and Labour Party Liaison Organisation
is the co-ordinating structure that supports the policy and campaign
activities of affiliated union members within the Labour Party at the
national, regional and local level.
As it was founded by the unions to represent the interests of
working-class people, Labour's link with the unions has always been a
defining characteristic of the party. In recent years this link has come
under increasing strain, with the RMT being expelled from the party in 2004 for allowing its branches in Scotland to affiliate to the left-wing Scottish Socialist Party. Other unions have also faced calls from members to reduce financial support for the Party and seek more effective political representation for their views on privatisation, public spending cuts and the anti-trade union laws. Unison and GMB have both threatened to withdraw funding from constituency MPs and Dave Prentis of UNISON has warned that the union will write "no more blank cheques" and is dissatisfied with "feeding the hand that bites us". Union funding was redesigned in 2013 after the Falkirk candidate-selection controversy. The Fire Brigades Union, which "severed links" with Labour in 2004, re-joined the party under Corbyn's leadership in 2015.
The party was a member of the Labour and Socialist International between 1923 and 1940. Since 1951, the party has been a member of the Socialist International,
which was founded thanks to the efforts of the Clement Attlee
leadership. In February 2013, the Labour Party NEC decided to downgrade
participation to observer membership status, "in view of ethical
concerns, and to develop international co-operation through new
networks". Labour was a founding member of the Progressive Alliance international founded in co-operation with the Social Democratic Party of Germany and other social-democratic parties on 22 May 2013.
For all detailed election results involving the Labour Party
including: general elections, devolved national elections, London
Assembly, London Mayoral, combined authority and European Parliament
elections see: Electoral history of the Labour Party (UK).
In all general elections since 1922, Labour has been either the governing party or the Official Opposition.
Following the 1918 general election, Labour became the Official Opposition after the Conservatives went into coalition with the Liberal Party. Labour's first minority governments came following the 1923 and 1929 general elections, the latter being the first time Labour were the largest party in the country by seats won. They formed their first majority government following the 1945 general election. However, after winning the 1950 general election, Labour would lose the following election in 1951 to the Conservatives despite gaining the highest share of votes to date at 48.8%. During the 1983 election, Labour posted their worst vote share in the post-war period at 27.6%. In 1997, a party record of 418 Labour MPs were elected. At the 2019 general election, 202 Labour MPs were elected, the lowest for the party since 1935. Since the 2010 general election, Labour have lost four consecutive general elections.The next general election is due to be held on 4 July 2024.
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