Tony Benn on Thatcher’s Election victory 40 years ago today: 3rd May 1979
On 3rd May 1979 there was a General Election. Jim Callaghan’s Labour Government had fallen on a vote of confidence (by one vote) at the end of March 1979.
The Tories won 339 seats and Labour 269 seats (Liberals 11). Tony Benn wrote in his diary:
3rd May
My majority went down (in Bristol) from over 9,000 to 1,890; the Liberal vote slumped and the Tories picked up the extra votes.. I declined steadfastly to go on any of the Election post-mortem programmes. The media was utterly corrupt in this Election, trying to make it a media event
4th May
A dramatic day in British politics. The most right-wing Conservative Government and leader for 50 years; the first woman Prime Minister. I cannot absorb it all
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