John Major

John Major (1943- ), British Conservative Party politician, Prime Minister of the United Kingdom (1990-1997). Atypically for a Conservative Party leader, Major was born into a working-class family in London and left school at the age of 16. He worked as a banker for nearly two decades until elected to Parliament in 1979 as Member of Parliament (MP) for Huntingdonshire (Huntingdon after 1983). A protégé of Margaret Thatcher, he rose rapidly through the Conservative government ranks, serving as Foreign Secretary (1989) and Chancellor of the Exchequer (1989-1990) before succeeding her as prime minister and party leader in November 1990. Like Thatcher before him, he continued the policy of privatization. Adopting a more consensual leadership style than she, he sought to restore party unity on integration with Europe and other issues.

In April 1992 he led the Conservatives to a general election victory (albeit with a reduced majority), but was faced with crisis in September 1992 when speculative attacks on the British pound forced its removal from the Exchange Rate Mechanism of the European Monetary System. Despite negotiating important concessions for Britain in the Treaty of Maastricht on closer European integration, Major was only just able to secure final ratification of the treaty by Parliament in July 1993, and was forced to call a vote of confidence, which he won. His negotiations with the Republic of Ireland in 1993, resulting in the joint “Downing Street Declaration” in December, paved the way for the ceasefire in Northern Ireland in August 1994 by the Irish Republican Army (IRA) and Protestant paramilitary factions. However, he was much criticized for failing to act strongly to assist the Bosnian government in the Bosnian-Croatian-Serbian War. Domestically, continuing economic problems and allegations of sleaze against Major’s government led to a series of defeats in by-elections and local elections, and the steady erosion of his parliamentary majority (down to one seat by the spring of 1996), which led after the breakdown of the IRA ceasefire in February 1996 to accusations that he was making concessions to Northern Irish Unionist MPs to sustain his government. His leadership was also attacked by dissident so-called “Eurosceptics” within his party, opposed to close ties with the European Union (EU).

In June 1995 Major called a party leadership election to reaffirm his authority, which he won despite the opposition of over a quarter of his party. In May 1996 he controversially threatened to cease cooperation with other European governments, following the EU’s refusal to lift a global ban on the export of British beef products, which it was feared had become contaminated with bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE). His administration suffered a serious blow in October 1996 when a parliamentary inquiry by the House of Commons standards and privileges committee began over allegations that a former Conservative junior minister, Neil Hamilton, had accepted bribes to ask questions in Parliament; in December the Conservative Paymaster General, David Willetts, resigned over having used undue influence over previous inquiries into Hamilton’s case, and having given incorrect evidence on the issue to the Standards and Privileges Committee.

By January 1997, Major’s government had lost its parliamentary majority, but he avoided any fatal crises for his administration before he called a general election in March. Major scheduled the election for May Day, making for a six-week general election campaign, the longest in modern British history: his party campaign was much criticized for indiscipline and incoherence, especially when declarations by his MPs forced him to call publicly for them to back his declared policy towards European Economic and Monetary Union. Major and his party suffered the worst Conservative defeat of any 20th-century general election on May 1, 1997, and on the morning of May 2 he stepped down as prime minister and announced his resignation as leader of the Conservative Party. He was succeeded as leader of the Conservative Party by William Hague. In December 1998 the new Labour government made him a Companion of Honour in recognition of his achievements in Northern Ireland, the first time that a former prime minister had been honoured with such a tribute by a politically opposed successor. He decided to stand down as MP at the 2001 general election. In April 2005, Major was made a Knight of the Garter.