Major, John

Major, John (b. 29 Mar. 1943). British Prime Minister 1990–7 Born in London of humble origins (which he later often emphasized), he held a variety of jobs, including as an accountant, and was a member of Lambeth Borough Council for the Conservative Party in 1968–71. Elected to Parliament for Huntingdonshire (Huntingdon from 1983) in 1979, he advanced quickly through the junior government ranks to become Minister of State for Social Security (1986–7), and Chief Secretary to the Treasury (1987–9). He was briefly Foreign Secretary in 1989, and was then Chancellor of the Exchequer until 1990, during which time, with Douglas Hurd, he secured Britain's entry to the ERM.

In November 1990, he succeeded Margaret Thatcher as Prime Minister, defeating Michael Heseltine and Dougles Hurd in the Conservative leadership election. Considered able and competent, but dull and unimaginative, his rapid political advance and subsequent success was possible precisely because few suspected it, while most thought he was the least divisive leader after Thatcher's traumatic demise. He ended the unpopular poll tax and signed the Maastricht Treaty. To general surprise, he was re-elected in 1992.

In many respects, he took Thatcherism to areas where even she was reluctant, such as the privatization of the railways and the attempted privatization of the Post Office. On the whole, however, his government was conspicuously lacking in major political innovations. Major never recovered from ‘Black Wednesday’ in 1992, when the Pound Sterling was forced to leave the ERM. This destroyed the Conservatives' reputation for economic management, which had been their unassailable advantage over the Labour Party before. His problems were compounded by the advent of the energetic and resourceful Tony Blair as leader of the Labour Party, and by perceptions of government ‘sleaze’, as highlighted in the Scott Report (1996), despite widespread acceptance of his personal integrity. Most of all, he was weakened by the divisions within his party over whether Britain should take up its right to opt out of the single currency as determined by the Maastricht Treaty.