Off and Running

Thatcher calls a snap election

The campaign will be brief, but the election will present British voters with their starkest choice in a half-century. Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher has steered her Conservative Party hard to the right over the past four years. At the same time, the Labor Party, under the lackluster and ineffectual leadership of Michael Foot, offers a platform that is more leftist than ever before. The Social Democratic Party/Liberal Alliance, which is competing in general elections for the first time, adds a new element of uncertainty to the contest. Said Labor M.P. Tony Benn: "This is going to be the most fundamental election campaign we have ever fought in our lives."

Thatcher's announcement last week of new elections caught even some of her closest aides by surprise. But once she had made the decision, she wasted not a moment. By breakfast time Monday, she had informed her Cabinet. Shortly after noon, she drove to Buckingham Palace to tell Queen Elizabeth II. Within the hour, the news was out: the Prime Minister had called general elections for June 9, nearly a year before her five-year term was up.

As Thatcher's senior advisers had pointed out to her in a weekend meeting at Chequers, the Prime Minister's country estate, she is in a stronger position than any other British political leader since World War II. The latest MORI (Market and Opinion Research International) poll showed the Conservatives ahead with 49%, compared with 34% for the Labor Party and 15% for the Social Democratic Party/Liberal Alliance. Thatcher would have preferred to hold elections later in the fall or even next year, but her advisers urged her not to delay. Local elections a week earlier had confirmed recent polls showing that the Labor Party was picking up strength. Inflation, now down to nearly 4%, is expected to rise again later in the year.

Labor's Foot derided the Prime Minister for her "irresolute rush" to elections and charged that "care and compassion had been thrown out the window" during her term. Labor had favored later elections to give the party more time to close the rift between its radical left and moderate wings. But there was also grumbling among some Tory M.P.s, who noted that the party had not even selected its candidates in 20 constituencies. In fact, the 31-day campaign will interfere with several important international meetings. Thatcher promptly canceled talks with President Reagan in Washington on May 27. But she still planned to attend the seven-nation economic summit in Williamsburg, Va., from May 28 to 30.

The fact that the opposition is divided is a major plus for the Tories. But both Labor and the Alliance will argue that Britain's economy is far worse as a result of Thatcher's four years in office. Unemployment now stands at 13.6%--21A times the level when she took office--and it is sure to rise during the coming year. Labor has called for a $17.5 billion reflation of the economy to create jobs, a prospect that frightens some moderate economists, while the Alliance is proposing a more restrained program of government spending to boost the economy. The Tories will respond that inflation is the lowest in 15 years, and the government's tough, antistrike policy has tamed the trade unions.

Another sharply drawn issue is defense. Although Labor's campaign manifesto carefully fudged its position to accommodate the strong internal differences, the party is on record as being opposed to the deployment of 160 U.S. cruise missiles. It also opposes the government's plans to purchase some 80 Trident submarine missiles from the U.S. Instead, Labor advocates a unilateral ban on all nuclear weapons in Britain. The party's candidates will undoubtedly get a strong boost from the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament, which has vowed to field an army of volunteers to help elect M.P.s who endorse antinuclear policies.

As party strategists hastily planned logistics and mapped schedules, all the political leaders decided to kick off the campaign in Scotland. Liberal Party Leader David Steel, the S.D.P.'s Roy Jenkins and Labor's Foot planned to be in Glasgow. Thatcher happened to have a speaking engagement at the Scottish Conservative Party conference in Perth. With all the polls showing the Prime Minister so far ahead, her biggest concern was complacency. As she told a gathering of Tory M.P.s last week, "Opinion polls do not win elections. Work does." This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so viewer discretion is required.