Dale - On This Day in Politics Britains Political History in 365 Days

ON THIS
DAY IN
POLITICS

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IAIN DALE

Published in hardback in Great Britain in 2022 by Allen & Unwin, an imprint of Atlantic Books Ltd.

Copyright Iain Dale, 2022

The moral right of Iain Dale to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by him in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act of 1988.

Chapter head illustrations by Carmen R. Balit

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior permission of both the copyright owner and the above publisher of this book.

Every effort has been made to trace or contact all copyright holders. The publishers will be pleased to make good any omissions or rectify any mistakes brought to their attention at the earliest opportunity.

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A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

Hardback ISBN: 978 1 83895 475 8

E-book ISBN: 978 1 83895 476 5

Printed in Great Britain

Allen & Unwin

An imprint of Atlantic Books Ltd

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2627 Boswell Street

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This book is dedicated to the memory of Sir David Amess MP

When Prime Minister Harold Macmillan was asked by a journalist what his greatest challenges were, his reply was very simple. Events, dear boy, events. Its an answer that any of our fifty-five prime ministers could have given, for it summed up how politicians can be blown completely off course by events. Or their names and reputations can be made or lost by a single event that they could never have anticipated. Boris Johnson expected to be the Brexit prime minister, the man who triumphantly took us out of the European Union. Instead, his legacy will probably be defined by his response to the Covid-19 pandemic, or the war in Ukraine. Events, dear boy, events.

Back in the late 1980s I bought a book in Foyles called A Chronology of Post-War British Politics, by political academic Geoffrey Foote. It listed all the main events in British politics day by day, month by month from 1945 until June 1987. I was flicking through it and started thinking about key dates in British politics prior to 1945. I started jotting down some examples, like the foundation of what many people view as the first English Parliament in 1265, the day in 1809 that Spencer Perceval became the first (and only) British prime minister to be assassinated, the day in 1707 when the Act of Union between England and Scotland was proclaimed. And so I went on. Within an hour I had a list of around thirty key events written down, and I realized how little I knew about most of them. I then did a quick Google search and to my absolute astonishment no one had ever written a book called On This Day in Politics. Dan Snow was about to publish one called On This Day in History, but surprisingly no one had collated all the key political events in our political history in one handy volume.

I then started a spreadsheet and started to allocate particular events to dates. It was like putting together a jigsaw. On some days there were five or six events to choose from different years in history. For others not so much. Indeed, for some days, I really had to scratch around to find anything notable that had happened on that particular day in British political history, but even then, I always discovered something I hadnt known about before. For example, 28 December proved to be such a day. I eventually discovered that Britains first national park, the Peak District, was declared that day in 1950. Obviously, we all know that the 194551 Labour government was famous for creating the NHS, nationalizations and giving India its independence. How many of us know that it also created the national parks programme? I certainly didnt, and was oblivious to the fact that the idea had been around since the 1880s. You will find little nuggets like that littered throughout this book. Ive tried to cover all the main events we all know about, and to provide an introduction to some of our most interesting politicians down the centuries.

Each event is covered on a single page in around 365 words 365 events, 365 pages, 365 words on each. Well, actually, thats a bit of a lie, as it would have been invidious to ignore events on 29 February, so its actually 366 days.

When planning this book I was conscious that I needed to achieve a balance. That meant not just including events we are all familiar with that occurred in the last two or three decades, but also including events from the early 1900s, the 1800s and even before. When I counted up the entries, there are thirty-one entries before 1800 and forty in the nineteenth century itself. The most entries for any particular year is eight, in 1990, the year of Margaret Thatchers defenestration and the first Gulf War. There are seven in 1963, 1967 and 1981. Since World War II there are only four years in which there are no entries in this book 1953, 1959, 2004 and 2006.

I also thought it would be interesting to see if there was an equal share of events for the seven days of the week. There wasnt. Unsurprisingly, the fewest entries are on Saturdays (thirty-five) and Sundays (twenty-nine). Forty-two events took place on Mondays, and Tuesday proved to be the most eventful day with seventy-three events, just ahead of Thursdays with seventy-one. On Wednesdays there were fifty-six events and Friday sixty.

This book is not meant to encompass a complete political history of the last thousand, or even two hundred years. What I hope it achieves is for your interest in different subjects to be piqued, and to encourage you to read more widely about events that I can only briefly describe. My original intent was for this book to be primarily aimed at people with a mild but not obsessive interest in current affairs and our political history. However, it soon became clear that it ought to appeal to political geeks too. People like me. When I started writing, I imagined that I would be able to write about a third of the entries off the top of my head, with no research. That proved not to be the case. In the end, I probably only wrote about ten of the entries straight off the bat. I discovered things I didnt know even when writing about contemporary events with which I am very familiar.

I would like to thank the following friends and colleagues who helped in the research and drafting process for this book. Catriona Beck, Mark Fox, Corey Froggatt, Robbie Hawkins, Mathew Hulbert, Sarah Mackinlay and Jakub Szweda have gone way beyond the call of duty, but I must make particular mention also of Noah Keate and Robert Waller.

Noah is a politics student and a devout listener to my For the Many podcast, and has spent hours and hours helping me with both the research and drafting of many of the entries you have read. I honestly could not have delivered this book on time without him. He has a fine future ahead of him in the political and journalism world.