History of The British Labour Party

History Of The British Labour Party

The Labour Party grew out of the trade union movement and socialist political parties of the 19th century, and surpassed the Liberal Party as the main opposition to the Conservatives in the early 1920s. It has had several spells in government, first as minority governments under Ramsay MacDonald in 1924 and 1929–31, then as a junior partner in the wartime coalition from 1940–1945, and then as a majority government, under Clement Attlee in 1945–51 and under Harold Wilson in 1964–70. Labour was in government again in 1974–79, under Wilson and then James Callaghan, though with a precarious and declining majority.

The previous national Labour government won a landslide 179 seat majority in the 1997 general election under the leadership of Tony Blair, its first general election victory since October 1974 and the first general election since 1970 in which it had exceeded 40% of the popular vote. The party's large majority in the House of Commons was slightly reduced to 167 in the 2001 general election and more substantially reduced to 66 in 2005. Under Gordon Brown it was defeated in the 2010 general election.