By 1990, Thatcher had been in power continuously for eleven years. She had earned the undying hatred of the working class, for whom she personified the viciousness of the employers. Her resignation in 1990 was brought about, not by the Labour “opposition” but by the mass revolt against the hated poll tax, in which the Marxists played a decisive role. The event drew scenes of great jubilation in all working-class areas. It was literally the talk of the town, in the clubs, pubs and bars. The “Iron Lady” had finally been driven out.
Thatcherism was largely discredited, so the strategy of the Tory leaders was to refurbish the image of the Tory party, or re-invent itself, for the general election. For this purpose, they chose John Major to head the Party. Despite the fact that the Tories were unpopular and Britain was in the grip of a new economic recession, Kinnock and the right-wing Labour leadership succeeded in losing another election. For the fourth time in a row, the Tories were victorious in the general election of May 1992. They could not believe their luck. But it was luck that could not last.
The Labour leadership proved incapable of offering a real alternative to the Tories. Neil Kinnock was forced to resign the Party leadership, and as a consolation was given a plum job, approved by the Tory Cabinet, as European Commissioner on a handsome salary of £103,534 per annum. This was the man who used to denounce the EEC in the most fiery terms as “the robber” of the people. But Kinnock’s resignation did not halt the continual shift to the right by the leadership. The new Labour leader John Smith was a barrister and traditional Old Labour right-winger.
A few months after the Tories were re-elected, Michael Heseltine announced a massive attack on the mining industry involving the closure of some thirty pits. The response was massive and instantaneous. In October, a giant mid-week demonstration of 50,000 miners and their supporters marched through the streets of London. The switchboards at TUC’s Congress House were jammed as workers from every town and city phoned to demand action.
Within a few weeks, the TUC were forced to call a national demonstration in support of the NUM. They were shocked by the response. Something like 250,000 turned out in the pouring rain to express their solidarity. These demonstrations and the incredible response from workers gave a glimpse of the potential power that exists in the working class. If that power had been properly harnessed and organised the pits could have been saved and the fortunes of the trade union movement turned around. It was not excluded that the government could have been toppled.
Unfortunately, so steeped in their “moderation” the TUC leaders allowed the mood to dissipate. They acted like the Grand Old Duke of York who led his troops a merry dance up and down a hill. Having used the demonstrations as a safety valve, the TUC refused to call any further actions. The result was predictable. The government recovered its nerve and resorted to the well-known ploy of setting up a Royal Commission to “look into” the pit closure programme. Instead of denouncing this obvious ruse to buy time, the TUC went along with these proposals. Despite one-day strikes of the RMT in the New Year, the miners were once again left to fight alone against the attacks of the Tories. The TUC strategy ended in ruins six months later, when even more pits were designated for closure than those originally named in October 1992.
The lack of a fight-back gave the green light to the Tories to press on with their anti-working class policies. They continued with their privatisation programme, targeting those areas of the public sector that were potentially profitable, and running down the rest. Gas, water and electricity were privatised and the rail network was also split up into 100 different operating companies and privatised. It was Thatcherism without Thatcher. Their policies represented a serious attack on local government, the health service, civil service and public services generally. The ruling class and its political representatives had abandoned all pretence at consensus politics. In place of “managed capitalism” we had the untrammelled domination of the “free market”. In face of the deepening crisis of British capitalism, the working class was being squeezed to the limit.
In October 1992 the country was in the grip of a deep economic crisis. The Tories had taken Britain into the European exchange rate mechanism. However, with sterling over-valued and a budget deficit at unsustainable levels, the currency was subjected to a barrage of speculation. In the end Britain was forced humiliatingly out of the ERM, and the Chancellor, Norman Lamont, was forced to resign on this “Black Wednesday”. Fears of economic turmoil increased as interest rates rose to 15 per cent, to the dismay of the Tories.
The Tory government, which in the past had a reputation for financial competence, was shaken to its very foundations. From then on, everything started to unravel. Support for the Tories in the opinion polls collapsed, and they would continue to trail behind Labour for the following four-and-a-half years. It signalled the beginning of the end for the Major government, which staggered on from one crisis to another.