Theresa May - A comparison of power

As Theresa May boxes up her belongings before returning to Maidenhead this week, she's probably well aware that her Premiership won't go down in history as one of the best: in fact, many people have already stated that Theresa May is the worst Prime Minister in British history, a bold statement to make. But in an age where social media can create echo chambers of opinion as quickly as a subject of opinion can say 'Fake News' to their scrutineers, rather than make a sweeping declaration, I'm going to delve back into history and see if we really can consider our lame-duck leader to be the worst to hold the office.

Robert Walpole is widely considered Britain’s first Prime Minister but trying to compare his performance to Theresa May’s is like comparing the work of Beethoven to that of Edvard Munch. Walpole’s power stemmed from his positions as Leader of the House of Commons and Chancellor, and much of his premiership was spent mediating between parliament’s various factions and at the same time trying to appease the George’s who chose him and then chose to keep him as their intermediary. Therefore it seems appropriate to rule out all Prime Ministers appointed by the monarch without a democratic mandate. This includes Lord North, widely seen as one of the worst Prime Minister’s ever by many academics.

William Gladstone was the first ‘First Lord of the Treasury’ to attempt to put himself in the public’s consciousness as a result of his Midlothian campaign. This alone warrants more praise than Theresa May who spent her sole general election campaign claiming she was the strong leader the country needed whilst simultaneously avoiding all public debates with the opposition and appearing weak and vulnerable, leaving her manifesto to speak for itself. And it did not speak positively. But, despite the improved accessibility of Gladstone, the level of public interest in his work remained low and despite the Voting reform acts of the 19th century - starting in 1832 - franchisement of the general public remained low. For one, women weren’t allowed to vote. So let’s skip ahead to a time where women could vote and go from there.

Where Brexit has brought up calls for a unity government to represent the wishes of all of the people, David Lloyd George did the same during WWI, joining with the Conservatives for a coalition government during a time of national crisis, even if it damaged the electability of the Liberals and bore rise to the modern two party system we know today, albeit in a gradual process taking several decades. Theresa May, only in April of this year, attempted to reach out to Labour, and I hope the irony wasn’t lost when she spoke of her distaste for the ‘uncompromising absolutism’ that politics was beginning to take a stranglehold of.

Stanley Baldwin and Ramsay MacDonald alternated power between them in the 1920s and 1930s, and MacDonald himself often found himself running minority governments limited in their scope of what they could achieve. Therefore, when another crisis hit, in this case the Great Depression and a demise in coal exports, MacDonald built a national government with Baldwin and the coalition worked to mitigate the worst effects of the depression. How much credit MacDonald can take personally for this is debatable given his ill health but his bipartisanship is nonetheless admirable. When Baldwin took over he was popular for his work in improving social welfare and sought to grant self-rule to India at a time when his party were strongly opposed.

However, both Baldwin and his successor are retrospectively judged by their foreign policy. It is worth noting that as a nation still recovering from the Great Depression and only 20 years on from the last world war, the desire for war was minimal. However, Chamberlain wasn’t fully prepared for the war and the Axis’ occupation of Norway, highlighted his flaws. Yet once again, he acknowledged his shortcomings and the need for unity and made way for Winston Churchill and yet another national government.

So much has been said of Winston Churchill, that I feel that I needn’t add much more, especially of his wartime government. But in 1945, after years of tragedy and loss, the country wanted peacetime prosperity and social change. And Clement Attlee was the man to deliver it. Having shown governmental competency in domestic affairs during the war, the Labour Party received a landslide majority and began to enact drastic reforms to create the welfare state, epitomised by the creation of the NHS in 1948. Even 11 years of Thatcherism wouldn’t undo this. Admittedly  aided by the large Commons majority, Attlee still kept his factions of modernisers and nationalisers in line, something Theresa May struggled to do both before and after her snap election.

So far, I think most people would put Theresa May below everyone discussed so far, except perhaps Chamberlain but his self-awareness, in my opinion, puts him above our lame duck. The observant of you may have noticed that I missed Bonar Law. However, his premiership was cut short by throat cancer after less than a year so any comparison seems unfair. 

Let’s continue:

Churchill’s second term was more controversial, believing in the British Empire and often taking direct action against the colonies seeking independence. His age also began to count against him, and it can mainly be attributed to his personal popularity and the ineffective leadership of Labour by Attlee, that allowed the Tories to win the general election of 1955.

Shortly afterwards, Churchill resigned and his deputy, Anthony Eden, assumed office.

Eden is the man most frequently ranked last in Prime Ministerial rankings by academics. Much of his unpopularity can be attributed to one issue, and this was one where there was no unity. The Suez Crisis saw the Egyptian President nationalise the Suez Canal, threatening the UK’s oil imports from the region. Eden led the coalition of the UK, Israel and France in military action against Egypt and was humiliated when both the UN, and the US ordered him to back down, ending Britain’s status as a global superpower and ending significant influence the UK had in the Middle East. Despite the initial invasion being popular, the UK’s rebuffal ended Eden’s political career, and he resigned. 

Let’s speed things up. Macmillan, Wilson and Heath all successfully managed their parties factions whilst providing professional leadership, through key events such as the Cuban Missile Crisis, decolonisation, and Britain’s entry into the Common Market. It was on this latter topic where Wilson used the referendum to his advantage and silenced the issue in the Labour Party for good, something Cameron was unable to do. 

Callaghan began to feel the strain of party factionalism and displayed poor judgement in not calling a general election when he was popular. However, by this point he was leading a minority government, and his personal popularity remained high despite heavy media attacks in the press and his struggles during the Winter of Discontent. When the election came, a loss appeared almost inevitable.

Thatcher fundamentally reshaped British politics, British government, and its economy. Her policies were divisive and it is difficult to review her premiership, at least domestically, in a non-partisan way. Whilst prior PMs were primus inter pares, Thatcher was a leader, a figure of authority, whose confrontational style at times verged on presidential. The military parade following the Falklands War showed her acting almost as a head of state. She was a leader of the nation with control of her party and represented the UK on the international stage more prominently than prior office holders, meeting Soviet leaders and strengthening the special relationship to new heights with Ronald Reagan, for better or for worse. She is ranked highly because she acted when others may have dithered, and she had the confidence and support of several world leaders, for better or for worse.

In contrast, John Major was less confrontational and his influence in British politics doesn’t extend as far as his predecessor or his successor. His tenure is known for creating the modern day divide in the Tory party over Europe, by signing the Maastricht Treaty, being caught up in sleaze scandals whilst trying to run a ‘Back to Basics’ campaign, and - perhaps more so since his time in office ended - initiating the Northern Ireland peace process. Where Theresa May let her critics circle her, Major was more confident, turning the Maastricht vote into one of confidence in the government. When ‘Eurobastards’ were hounding him, Major resigned so that his critics could either ‘put up or shut up’. Whilst the uniting of factions failed to materialise afterwards, Major endeavoured to unite the party where May did not. 

Blair and Brown were a double act, though as leaders they were vastly different. Blair was perhaps more presidential than Thatcher, in his statements and appearance. His position was unchallenged in the party for 8 years and such was his personal popularity, he didn’t need to worry about dissenting members of the hard left. His judgement though will forever be scarred by his invasion into Iraq, a decision which has turned him from one of the most popular politicians to one of the most hated. I suspect the jury will be out on Mr Blair for some time. For someone who’d been eyeing the top job since at least 1994, when it finally came to Gordon Brown, he didn’t seem ready. After initially dithering on whether to call an election, his dithering proved costly as the recession hit and incumbent politicians around the world suffered a setback. Then when an election came, with unemployment rising and a fresh-faced modernised opposition from both the Tories and the Lib Dems, Gordon stood little chance. However, under Brown party discipline was far stronger than under Major, May, and even Callaghan, and his work in fixing the nation’s economy should not be forgotten. Yet, Brown’s premiership is far from glorious.

And so to David Cameron, the man who arguably made Theresa May’s job that much worse. There was a window, from May’s rise to power to her calling a snap election, where she was immensely popular, at one point with a 20 point lead over the fractured Labour Party in the polls. Then, when Article 50 was triggered it all turned sour. I wonder if David Cameron was attempting to replicate Harold Wilson’s successful use of the plebiscite when he called the 2016 European election. After all, he had already won similar polls on electoral reform, and Scottish independence. Perhaps the referendum itself wasn’t the mistake, but the campaign. A campaign so disorganised, old fashioned and built upon the principle of scare-mongering the electorate into taking us away from the status quo. A campaign which was partisan, despite the majority of parliament supporting remain, Labour were unable to join forces with the government owing perhaps to Corbyn’s eurosceptic tendencies. We could also speak of alleged Russian interference, illicit fundraising and data harvesting by the opposition, but these are not Cameron’s fault directly. Perhaps worst of all, Cameron failed to allow the civil service to prepare for any eventualities meaning that when Article 50 was triggered, as Frans Timmermans so eloquently put it ‘it was like Lance Corporal Jones it was “don’t panic don’t panic”’ as no plan was put in place.

For David Cameron, his prior 6 years of government, including 5 in coalition, will be overshadowed by calling a referendum and losing. 

It is remarkably common for Premierships  to be defined by key events. Wars, recessions, crises, party faction splits, referenda. What perhaps is even more remarkable is the amount of times politicians have compromised and been able to unite behind certain goals. Bipartisanship has been a frequent feature of government for decades and when it has not been required, parties have been able to unite and despite their broad churches, come together as a united entity and appear electable. The exception sadly appears to be the present. 

Theresa May will probably rank as worst of the listed Prime Ministers above, perhaps with David Cameron for company. Not because of her policies specifically but because of her inability to compromise and lead effectively both her party and the nation; her struggles to connect to the general public and perhaps most importantly of all - her naivety of the challenges that lay ahead. 

After all of this, Theresa May might not mind going back home now. She can be fairly confident, at least, that she won’t be needing to sign many autographs any time soon.

FOOTNOTE: Alec Douglas-Home has also been left out due to his brief premiership. Though as someone who went from being Prime Minister to Foreign Secretary under Ted Heath, we could presume he would put the party’s best interests ahead of his own.