25 years ago this week the Conservative Party were in the process of electing a new leader after Margaret Thatcher, Prime Minister for over 11 years, stood down. The story of Thatcher’s resignation has long been a controversial one within the Conservative Party, seen by some as an ‘assassination’ and by many as high political drama. This is reflected in many of our oral history … Continue reading Memories of Thatcher’s fall
The Labour party’s leadership contest comes to a close this week, with the winner announced at a special conference on Saturday. Our oral history project features many former Labour MPs’ recollections of leadership contests, and the consequences of them, particularly in the 1980s as the party grappled with life in opposition and internal divisions between left and right. Former MP for Ipswich, Ken Weetch, described … Continue reading Labour leadership elections through the years
As many of you will know, over the past two years we’ve run a wonderful oral history project in Devon with the support of the Heritage Lottery Fund: ‘From the Grassroots: an oral history of community politics in Devon.’ Sadly the project is about to come to an end – but not before we were able to record 70 interviews with local political activists, soon … Continue reading New website material on ‘From the Grassroots’
Seventy years ago yesterday the results of the 1945 General Election were declared. Although the poll had been held on 5 July, the results were only announced on the 26th because of the time needed to return the ballots of service men and women from overseas. The result – a Labour landslide – had a dramatic impact on British politics. The new government led by … Continue reading 1945 Election: A political awakening
Reporting back from our latest ‘Parliaments, politics and people‘ seminar – our ‘From the Grassroots’ project co-ordinator, Dr Kayleigh Milden, shared some of the new archive’s secrets… In this seminar I explored approaches in oral history and how this related to the research undertaken for the HLF-funded History of Parliament project ‘From the Grassroots: an oral history of community politics in Devon’. Oral history is … Continue reading Parliaments, Politics and People seminar: Kayleigh Milden, ‘From the Grassroots: An oral history of community politics in Devon.’
This week at Westminster MPs elected for the first time will still be finding their feet. With such a large new intake these certainly will not be on their own, but how will they be feeling? This question is one we ask former MPs when we interview them for our oral history project. There are some very common answers (we’ve lost track of how many … Continue reading How does it feel to be a new MP?
We were delighted to formally open our ‘From the Grassroots’ exhibition last week at the Forum, University of Exeter. ‘From the Grassroots’ has, with the generous support of the HLF, been collecting memories of political activism in Devon since 1945. Here our project coordinator, Dr Kayleigh Milden, shares her thoughts on the exhibition… Creating the exhibition from scratch has been a wonderful experience. Standing back … Continue reading From the Grassroots exhibition launched
Today’s blogpost is from one of our Oral History Project interviewers, Emme Ledgerwood, who has used our archive to explore the experience of candidate selection… The vast majority of MPs arrive at Westminster on a party ticket, and one of the most critical junctures on that road remains getting selected as a prospective parliamentary candidate for a political party. Candidate selection is governed only by … Continue reading MPs’ memories of candidate selection
On 27 October we held our first ‘witness seminar’ at the Devon Heritage Centre as part of From the Grassroots: an oral history of community politics in Devon. The aim of a witness seminar is to bring together a small group of people who were involved in particular event or organisation to share their memories. The result is different from a one-on-one oral history interview … Continue reading Exeter elections in the 1990s: Witness Seminar
In tomorrow’s by-election in Clacton, former Conservative MP Douglas Carswell will contest his previous seat after defection to UKIP. Carswell’s strong difference of opinion with his party over the issue of Europe has echoes of a different by-election – Lincoln in 1973 – but the parties and positions were reversed. When Britain was applying to join the then European Economic Community (EEC) in the 1960s … Continue reading Defection, by-elections and Europe… in the 1970s.
