Save Your Seat, Save Your Party, and Save Your Country

With very few examples of a Party Leader surviving a leadership challenge when in office as Prime Minister, I racked my brains as to the last time someone had and ... I came up John Major in 1995*.

The 1992 Black Wednesday sterling crisis when Britain crashed out the European Exchange Rate Mechanism causing a totally unnecessary and self inflicted double dip recession had resulted in some consternation on the Tory back benches who were looking at wipeout by Tony Blair's New Labour in two years time.  It had been John Smith's New Labour but John had died of a massive heart attack a year earlier and the Conservatives were very concerned that under Blair Labour might be electable.  Particularly since their own reputation for economic competence had gone for a Burton.  Ah the good old days when the Tories bankrupted the country by trying to get closer to Europe rather than leave it entirely...

As a result John Major was recorded off mic in a TV studio muttering about "bastards" in his own party.  No one ever seemed to actually challenge though so Major took the initiative and called his own leadership election at the time of his choosing rather than his enemies.  None of his critics (mainly Portillo) however were up for handing in their plumb Ministerial positions in order to go over-the-top.  Therefore a stalking horse candidate was found.  Junior Minister and arch-Eurosceptic John Redwood.  He was strongly endorsed by the Sun under the slogan "Redwood or Deadwood".

John Major was roundly mocked at the time for being the grey man of politics so it was a bit of a laugh that the Tory Parliamentary Party had shopped around and managed to find someone even greyer with even less personality to stand against him.  Redwood was so stiff, dead fishlike and non-media-friendly that he was referred to by his colleagues as "the Vulcan" - possibly a bit insulting to the late Leonard Nimoy who's depiction of Mr Spock was endowed with considerably more charisma.  If you're too young to remember how wooden Redwood was think Liz Truss as a bloke.  An ideological bore on the party's far right.  To this day I'm still convinced that Liz Truss is actually clockwork.  Anyway...

In order to win the Leadership 1922 Committee exhaustive ballot John Major had to obtain not just a majority but a majority+15% in order for a second round of the contest which other candidates could then join to occur.  This he did by schmoozing with his backbenchers in a way that was beyond Mr Redwood's social skills and no second round occured.  Major just scraped past the 65% margin with 66% of the Parliamentary Party.  Of course Redwood would never have become Prime Minister, he was a stalking horse for other candidates, but Major effectively used him to represent all the fears of change he knew his colleagues had and ran a better-the-devil-you-know campaign... The leadership election also allowed his critics to let off steam, grievances to be aired and policy debated...

His internal critics muted John Major clung on as by-election natural wastage reduced his small majority to a minority government propped up by supply and demand agreements with the Ulster Unionists.   He still clung on to the last possible moment though before being constitutionally forced to call an election and led his party to a massive defeat in 1997.  Was keeping his backbenchers in their jobs rather than throwing them under the bus like Rishi Sunak part of the deal he struck with them? because there was literally no point in his government by this time.  It couldn't get any legislation through and seemed to exist solely to keep Labour out and the (mainly) boys in jobs...  People who complain about governments changing too often - you've never had it so good!

John Major hung on for one more Parliament after that as a backbench MP.  Redwood carried on as an MP till 2024 when he stood down but was never trusted with a Ministerial position ever again.  Portillo was famously handed his arse by his own constituents having gained the media reputation of a slimy toad.  How we all laughed at the time.  If only we'd known them that this would result in him filling the telly with boring travelogues for the next 25 years.  We're not laughing now.  Honestly it's like you can't go on a train these days with risking bumping into Michael Portillo and his film crew ... One wonders if Mr Burnham's naked ambition will be rewarded in a similar way...

* Okay technically Boris Johnson survived his June 2022 contest but since his government imploded shortly afterwards it was a bit of a pyrrhic victory...