British Elections & Parties Review

Philip Cowley, David Denver, Justin Fisher, Andrew Russell

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2014
• Print ISBN:
  9780714650159
• eBook ISBN:
  9781135302337
• Topic: Politics & International Relations
• Subtopic: Political Parties
• Index: Politics & International Relations

The "British Elections and Parties" series publishes research on parties, elections and voting behaviour in Britain, providing analyses of current and historical developments. It is produced under the auspices of the Political Studies Association's Election, Public Opinion and Parties study group. Volume 9 includes research based around four themes: electoral reform; partisanship and voting; parliamentary behaviour; and the attitudes of the young. It provides a source of data on public opinion polls, a summary of local election results, UK referendums, key economic indicators, political parties and a chronology of major political events in 1998.

Reference Section

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As in previous volumes, we provide here a reference section in which assorted information, which is likely to be useful to readers but which takes a good deal of digging out, is collected and presented in a convenient form. The subjects covered are broadly the same as before. Unfortunately for election-watchers there were no parliamentary by-elections during 1998 but we have included details of the results of the 1997 Scottish and Welsh devolution referendums, and the referendums held in Northern Ireland and London in the spring of 1998.

The section begins with a chronology of important political events during 1998, prepared as usual by David Broughton. We then move on to summaries of opinion poll results, giving monthly figures for voting intention in all the main polls, voting intentions in Scotland from System Three and, from Gallup, data on ratings of party leaders, preferences for Prime Minister, approval of the government’s record, personal prospective economic evaluations and perceptions of economic competence. There follows a summary of the results of the local elections held in England on 7 May 1998 — the first major test at the polls for the new government.

After the referendum results we provide details of key economic indicators before an extensive section on the political parties, which includes not only details of party officers and addresses, but also data on key internal elections. We conclude with our usual table detailing circulation of national newspapers.

We would like to thank those who have helped in the gathering, checking and preparation of the material in this section, especially David Broughton, Colin Railings, Michael Thrasher, Mark Stuart, Simon Atkinson and Ben Marshall.

Justin Fisher
Philip Cowley
David Denver
Andrew Russell

1. Chronology of Events 1998

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JANUARY

2.The High Court ruled that the 17-year-old son of a Cabinet Minister who had admitted selling illegal drugs could be named, after much speculation in the tabloid press. The naming allowed the Cabinet Minister concerned (Home Secretary Jack Straw) to comment on the matter.

5.The Chancellor of the Exchequer, Gordon Brown, promised a ‘national crusade’ against unemployment at the launch of the government’s New Deal for unemployed young people between the ages of 18–24.

8.The Labour Party expelled two of its members of the European Parliament (Ken Coates and Hugh Kerr) after they continued to criticize the leadership of Prime Minister Tony Blair, particularly with respect to welfare reform plans and the centrally controlled decisions regarding the candidates’ list for the European Parliament elections in 1999.

9.The Secretary of State for Northern Ireland, Mo Mowlam, made an unprecedented visit to the Maze Prison near Belfast for direct talks with loyalist prisoners in an attempt to keep the peace process on track.

11.John Wells, satirist, co-writer of the Dear Bill letters in Private Eye, died aged 61.

12.William St...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Table of Contents
• Notes on Contributors
• Abstracts of Articles
• Electoral Reform and its Discontents
• New Labour’s Landslide and Electoral Bias: An Exploration of Why the 1997 UK General Election Result Differed from the Previous Thirteen
• Reforming the Westminster Electoral System: Evaluating the Jenkins Commission Proposals
• Party Policy and Electoral Reform: A Survey of Developments, Motives and Prospects
• New Labour’s New Partisans: The Dynamics of Party Identification in Britain since 1992
• ‘Independents’, ‘Switchers’ and Voting for Third Parties in Britain 1979–92
• Improving the Measurement of Party Identification in Britain
• Settled Will or Divided Society? Voting in the 1997 Scottish and Welsh Devolution Referendums
• The Absence of War? New Labour in Parliament
• MPs and Europe: Enthusiasm, Circumspection or Outright Scepticism?
• Nowhere to Run…? British MEPs and the Euro
• Young People and Contemporary Politics: Committed Scepticism or Engaged Cynicism?
• References Section
• 1. Chronology of Events 1998
• 2. Public Opinion Polls 1998
• 3. Local Elections 1998
• 4. UK Referendums 1997–98
• 5. Economic Indicators
• 6. Political Parties
• 7. National Newspapers
• Notes for Contributors