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The era of new Labour 1997-2007 - Coggle Diagram
The era of new Labour 1997-2007
The Labour governments
Blair as leader, Character and ideology
Blair was a new kind of labour politician. He had not joined the party until after he had graduated. this made it easier for him to move the labour party away from its traditional views and beliefs He argued that tis was necessary if the labour party was going to remain relevant in the modern day. The changes in British society meant that they could no longer rely on the working class vote electing them into government. Blair was very charismatic. He was able to show he was in touch with the electorate. Blair's popularity soared to 93% according to the internal labour party poll.
Blair did not want to reverse many of Thatcher and Major's policies. Much of the Cons trade union reform was accepted. Critics argued that Blair didn't stand for anything and had accepted Thatcherite policies to win power. The methods used to win the election continued after it. Despite the landslide victory and despite the problems in the Conservative party, many people in the labour party were worried success wouldn't last.
Constitutional change
Mayor of london
Following a referendum among voters of London in 1998 the government introduced the Greater London Authority act in 1999 under which arrangements were made for the election of a mayor of London who would be an executive figure responsible for governing Greater London
House of lords
The reforms to parliament raised difficulties for the government. It ended the right of unelected peers to sit in the upper house it was intended to allow more democracy. The problem was what form the new chamber would take and what powers it would have. Blair created more life peers, which were members who has been elected to the house of lords. Lots of people were unhappy including some labour members
Devolution
Labour honoured that it mentioned devolution in its manifesto by creating a Scottish and Welsh parliament/assembly.
The Scottish parliament was established in 1998 after a referendum in the previous year. Three quarters of the voters opted for a system in which Scotland would remain a part of the UK but it would run its affairs by a Scottish parliament.
The welsh assembly was established 1998 after a referendum the previous year. Initially the assembly was a revising chamber, but later legislation gave wales governmental powers.
Citizens' rights
A freedom of information act was passed in 2000. This gave people the right to request information from public bodies. By 2006 over 100,000 requests were being made each year. Tony Blair later described this as a mistake. He argued that he had not realised its implications because he had only just become prime minister but that its existence would prevent politicians from making Difficult decisions because they feared thier actions would become public knowledge.
Domestic Policies
Labour had won the 1997 election with a manifesto which concentrated on improving public services. The pledge card identified how they would do this and by 2001 all of these 5 pledges had been met.
The pledges made in the 1997 pledge card were not overly ambitious. Tony Blair had promised 'Education, education education'. The labour government kept the league tables and inspections. Targets were extended and more specialist schools were encouraged.
Blair had promised that labour would be 'tough on crime, tough on the causes of crime' this was designed to counter the belief that conservatives were the tough ones on crime. There were measures to reduce social exclusion but this was paired with longer prison sentences
At the 2001 election the labour party promised more investment in health and education that combined with reform would improve their quality. There would be more Teachers, doctors and nurses but also more accountability to parents and patients about test results and short waiting times. A special delivery unit was set up in July 2001 to ensure the reforms happened. However the reforms were very slow
Blair's government also had to face some crises, rising fuel costs led to a blockade in 2000 by farmers and lorry drivers. Foot and mouth hit farmers of cattle and sheep leading to a cull of 10million animals. People in the countryside felt that Labour was to urban and didn't understand rural problems. This came to a head when the government tried to ban hunting with dogs. There was a long battle with the house of lords and a demonstration in 2002 where half a million people showed up. The ban was finally passed in 2004
Brown and Economy policy
Gordon brown was an extremely important figure throughout this period. He was the Chancellor of the Exchequer during the period.
His initial priorities were to keep inflation low and to keep government under control. Brown also wanted to prove that labour was pro-business and could be trusted with running the economy to enable them to move away from the image that labour was a 'tax and spend' party.
Brown also made the bank of England independent from the government. This meant that the government would set a target for inflation but it was up to the bank to decided where to set interest rates. Brown also set up the treasury rules about how much could be borrowed by the government. According to brown he this was 'prudence for a purpose'. He wanted a stable economy to improve public services.
After 2001 there was an injection of money into public services. The increases in investment were seen in new schools and hospitals and pay rises for doctors, nurses and teachers. Exam results went up and waiting lists went down. Labour argued that this funding was needed due to neglect under the conservatives.
So they didn't have to raise taxes Labour continued to use private sources to fund public services. While using PFIs the buildings got completed quickly but debts were stored up for the future.
During Gordon Browns time as chancellor He had kept inflation under control and record number of people were in work. Living standards remained high and the consumer economy boomed
Northern Ireland and the Good Friday Agreement
Blair inherited a great political opportunity. He wanted to further develop the confidence that major bought to both sides. Both sides trusted a chairman of the talks, George Mitchell. Blair developed a the head of the government in Ireland. The labour secretary of state kept the paramilitaries on board by visiting them in prison.
The tense final negotiation in April of 1998 went on for 17 hours after the final deadline set by Mitchell was missed. one of the Ulster Unionist Party members walked out in protest of lack of progress in ensuring that the IRA would have its arms Decommissioned. On April 10th George Mitchell announced that an agreement had been reached and there would be a referendum to this agreement. The referendum would be held in both the Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland.
Good Friday agreement stated:
Parties would use their influence to ensure the decommissioning of arms.
There should be an independent commission to oversee reform of policing
Links between the 3 countries would be strengthened between countries.
There could be early release of prisoners where paramilitary organisations were committed to peace
The referendum was held on the 22nd may: in Northern Ireland 71% voted for the agreement and in the Republic 94% voted yes. There was still opposition from both sides. In the following 10 years there were lots of disagreements especially over the release of prisoners and wether the paramilitary groups were really decomissioning
A devolved Assembly along with a power sharing executive would be set up
Both the Uk and the Irish Republic would give up their claim on Northern Ireland and let the people of NI decide if it wanted to remain apart of the UK or join the Irish republic.