History of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Previous History of Great Britain: History of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland

After the Irish War of Independence , the Anglo-Irish Treaty was signed in 1921 , which guaranteed independence from Great Britain for 26 of the 32 Irish counties . The six northern counties of Ulster remained part of the United Kingdom as Northern Ireland . The official name changed to " United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland " in 1927 .

Interwar period

Domestic politics

The liberals, who had politically determined the 19th century, increasingly lost their importance. One reason for this was the fact that voters defined themselves more strongly by belonging to the bourgeois or working class, and thus tended to be either Conservative or Labor. In addition, the numerous state interventions in many policy areas during the First World War had programmatically damaged the Liberals. A dispute between Lloyd George and Herbert Henry Asquith in 1916 led to a real split and thus weakening of the liberals. Initially, the Conservatives in particular benefited from this development, as the Labor Party was not yet strong enough to win a majority in the House of Commons.

One of the most important points of contention in post-war politics was the dispute over a protectionist or a free trade-oriented economic policy. This debate brought both the Liberals and Labor up votes in the 1923 election, which in 1924 led to the first Labor minority government under Ramsay MacDonald with liberal approval, but in the same year the Conservatives took over the post of prime minister after new elections with Stanley Baldwin .

The 1920s were marked by hard labor disputes, which ignited the planned privatization of the internationally hardly competitive mining industry. In 1926, a miners' strike expanded into a general strike , but it soon collapsed. Together with a subsequent ban on strikes, this failure led to a weakening of the unions.

In 1928 women aged 21 and over were given the right to vote . The Labor Party first became the strongest party in the 1929 elections , and Ramsay MacDonald formed a minority government that plunged into a government crisis after two years.

The Westminster Statute of December 11, 1931 confirmed the Dominions status established in 1926 , see below . In order to cope with the global economic crisis, British policy from 1931 to 1935 under Prime Minister Ramsay MacDonald relied on the participation of liberal and conservative ministers. Ramsay's conservative successor Stanley Baldwin also pursued this multi-party course ; he is referred to as “ National Government ”. However, the resistance of parliamentarians led to party division tendencies. Under both governments, an economic policy based on the principles of the economist John Maynard Keynes was pursued.

The reputation of the monarchy was damaged when Edward VIII insisted on marrying an American woman who had already been divorced twice. In 1936 he was forced to abdicate.

Foreign policy

In terms of foreign policy, Great Britain initially emerged stronger from the First World War. As a result of the largely non-fighting destruction of the German fleet, the most important competing sea power had disappeared without any major use of British naval resources. The colonial empire was enlarged by the acquisition of former German colonies, but even more by parts of the Ottoman Empire . In addition, Russia was initially eliminated as a geopolitical competitor as a result of the revolution . Overall, under the impression of the strong peace movement, an attitude prevailed among the workers after the war that relied on negotiations to settle international disputes and from which the appeasement policy later developed.

Relations with the USA were ambivalent. The United States outperformed Britain as the world's most important economic power in the interwar period. In addition, the American fleet began to reach the size of the British. British foreign policy remained uncertain when it came to dealing with the United States because the United States wavered between isolationism and intervention. In 1921 and 1922 there were a number of conferences in Washington in which the two countries concluded a naval agreement, but the British had to terminate their alliance with Japan.

The attitude towards post-revolutionary Russia was even more ambivalent. Although British politics initially supported the forces loyal to the Tsar, there was strong sympathy for the communist side among the workers. In the early post-war years, British governments struggled to assess Russia's future role and importance, but a slow convergence began. Support for retreating troops loyal to the Tsar declined, while cautious ties were forged with the communist government. A first trade agreement was concluded in 1921, and official diplomatic relations were established in 1924.

In Great Britain, French foreign policy was viewed with suspicion, which was believed to have attempted hegemony on the continent. A possible recovery of Germany was seen as a danger, but Lloyd George in particular valued the importance of a stable Germany for the economy of Central Europe. Politically, he recognized the importance of an important counterweight to France and communist Russia. British policy therefore turned largely unanimously against the occupation of the Ruhr , tried to moderate the reparations demands of the victorious powers against Germany and showed understanding for German efforts after a partial revision of the Versailles treaties .

In the British colonies, the local elites began to develop a sense of self. This movement was initially strongest in India and was supported by the Congress Party under Mahatma Gandhi . While the colonial administration was usually ready to make concessions, the central government demanded repression. In the 1930s, Indians began to have a certain say in their country. Similar developments also took place in China and Egypt. In the colonies such as Canada and Australia, the development towards greater independence, which had already begun, reached a preliminary climax: With the Balfour definition , extensive self-government was formulated as Dominions in 1926 and enshrined in the Westminster Statute in 1931. This began the dissolution of the British Empire , which was to come to an end after the Second World War.

The National Socialist takeover of power was seen in Great Britain as the beginning of the "Germany's revival" that had been expected since the end of the war. The British governments rejected alliance offers from Hitler, but strengthened their negotiating policy, which was geared towards appeasement , and at the same time tried to keep the USA and the Soviet Union out of these negotiations in order to remain the decisive power in the integration of National Socialist Germany. Only a few Conservative MPs, Labor and Winston Churchill spoke out decisively against appeasement towards Germany. Because of the tense budget situation , the government was also interested in limiting armaments costs (after extreme disarmament after the First World War) and therefore concluded a British-German fleet agreement in 1935 , in which the ratio of the fleets to 35: 100 (D: GB) was established. In order not to jeopardize the improved relationship with Germany and because of the anti-war mood among the population, Great Britain approved the German invasion of the demilitarized Rhineland in 1936, although this contradicted the Treaty of Versailles and in 1938 accepted the " annexation of Austria " to Germany. In the course of his appeasement policy , Arthur Neville Chamberlain even campaigned for the adoption of the Munich Agreement of 1938, which obliged Czechoslovakia to cede the Sudetenland to Germany. At this point, most of his cabinet refused to continue supporting the appeasement with the prime minister. It was only when Hitler invaded Prague, contrary to his promises, in March 1939, that the United Kingdom promised Poland , Greece and Romania military support in the event of a German invasion. As early as 1932 Great Britain had deviated from the disarmament policy since 1918, and modernization programs were launched in 1934/35, primarily for the Air Force and Navy. In April 1939, in the face of an impending German invasion, general conscription was reintroduced and negotiations with France and the Soviet Union began.

The growing power of the labor force, the new rights of women and the increasing independence of the Dominions can, among other things, be explained. a. interpreted as a consequence of the concessions the government made to these groups during the war to include them in the general war effort.

Economic development in the interwar period

During the First World War, agricultural production had increased enormously, partly through government enforcement measures. The reason for this was the decline in imports due to the German submarine war . However, the actual modernization did not begin until after the war with the mechanization of agriculture based on the American model. On the eve of the Second World War, the state intervened more strongly again, with the aim of greater self-sufficiency. Artificial fertilizers, sugar beets and animal husbandry were encouraged.

In the field of heavy industry, the former global leading nation had already faced massive competition shortly before the First World War, especially from the USA and Germany. Both coal mining and shipbuilding did not reach the level of before 1914 in the interwar period. Only the steel output continued to rise. In addition, coal was increasingly being replaced by oil as an energy source. In the 1930s, large parts of the country were connected to the electricity network. In the textile industry, Asian countries increasingly competed with Great Britain. In the new branches of industry such as the electrical, automotive and chemical industries, the country did not have an advantage over the other industrialized countries. In addition, London lost its position as the most important banking location in the world to New York. The war loans raised, especially in the USA, weighed on the British economy. The USA and China had taken important sales markets in Asia from Great Britain during the war.

Economic policy never completely returned to the free trade orientation of the 19th century after the extensive interventions of the war economy. The consequences of the war also included a large burden of debt on the part of the state.

The Great Depression of 1929 had in the UK less affected than in the US or in Germany. However, the unemployment rate reached twelve percent in 1932. In response to the crisis, protectionist trade policies at the Commonwealth level were followed.

Social development until 1930

Population growth continued, albeit at a significantly lower level than in the 19th century. From 41.5 million inhabitants in 1901, the population rose to 47 million by 1931. The reason for the low growth was the declining birth rate, which in turn was due to the beginning of family planning.

Overall, the income conditions of the workers improved, especially in the course of the First World War. The proportion of the poor population steadily decreased. The state social network only played a limited part in this. Politics in the form of housing subsidies had a stronger effect on the improvement of housing conditions in the interwar period. In the middle class, living in their own home became the norm during this time. In addition, ownership of automobiles and household appliances increased, meat consumption increased, as did consumption of entertainment services. Also in the early 20th century, popular cultural production began to develop in various genres.

Second World War

Churchill 1944

On September 3, 1939, following the German invasion of Poland, the United Kingdom and France declared war on Germany . During the war in Poland, the British army could not intervene due to the rapid advance of the Germans. Rather, domestic political preparations for war were first made. Chamberlain accepted Winston Churchill , previously the leader of the internal party opposition and fierce critic of appeasement, as Minister of the Navy in his war government . In addition, taxes were increased, important goods were rationed and conscription was reintroduced. The first military action was a naval blockade against the German Reich. Ground troops were used for the first time against the German invasion of Denmark and Norway , but then withdrew without major combat operations, because the Germans were again surprisingly quick. In response, Churchill became the new Prime Minister and formed a coalition government . In France, the British expeditionary army was defeated in the Battle of Dunkirk at the beginning of June 1940 and the expeditionary army was happily evacuated in Operation Dynamo .

France capitulated in June 1940 and the United Kingdom was isolated. In the summer and autumn of 1940, the decisive phase of the Battle of Britain took place. The German Air Force first tried to destroy its British counterpart on the ground in order to prepare for an invasion of the island. When this failed, Hitler gave up the invasion plans in the autumn of 1940 and increasingly relied on the aerial warfare against English cities. German air strikes destroyed Coventry , large parts of London and other cities and killed more than 32,000 civilians. As early as February 1940, British troops in Abyssinia had successfully taken action against Italy as an ally of Germany and had thus also become active in the African theater of war, above all to protect its positions in the Middle East. The situation eased somewhat when the United States supported Great Britain with war material in early 1941 ( Lending and Lease Act of March 11, 1941) and in August the Atlantic Charter was agreed between Churchill and American President Franklin D. Roosevelt . In 1941, compulsory service for women between the ages of 20 and 30 was introduced, which in 1942 was extended to 18 to 50 years.

After the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor in December 1941, large parts of the British Empire in Southeast Asia were occupied by the Japanese and Churchill's position was weakened. In the spring of 1942, the British Air Force began to intensify attacks on targets in Germany, initially only military installations were put under fire, but also cities quickly, although this procedure was also controversial in Great Britain. In August 1942, a short-term landing on the French coast, carried out as a practice, failed . On December 1, 1942, Lord William Beveridge presented a report on the establishment of the welfare state .

From the end of 1942 onwards there were military successes, on the one hand in the North African campaign led by General Bernard Montgomery , on the other hand in the invasion of Sicily and Italy in 1943, and finally in the invasion of France in 1944 and the final defeat of Germany in 1945. Around 300,000 British soldiers were fallen, around 60,000 British civilians perished in German air strikes . The last civilians to die in war on British soil had been killed by Nazi Germany's weapons of retaliation .

Since the Second World War

Post-war period (1945–1951)

Despite the military victory, the Conservatives were voted out of office on July 5, 1945, and Clement Attlee became the first Labor Prime Minister with his own parliamentary majority. For the first time Labor had succeeded in gaining a large number of middle-class voters. Although the British state had great financial difficulties 1945-1947, Attlee began some nationalizations ( Bank of England , coal mining, transportation, gas and electricity supply and - particularly controversial - iron and steel industry). The British Overseas Airways Corporation had been nationalized since 1939. Attlee lifted restrictions on union work and introduced comprehensive social security legislation in 1946, as well as the National Health Service . Both were based on the concepts developed during the war and were supported by a large majority in the population and in politics. The Attlee government continued the state-controlled economic policy of the war years, oriented it in a Keynesian way and, in addition to the war credits , took out large-scale loans to finance the welfare state , especially with the USA. Almost all of his extensive economic policy projects were focused on the fight against unemployment . An education policy that was supposed to raise the level of education overall and increase equal opportunities was also part of the reform program and was accompanied by the establishment of numerous new universities. At first, Attlee's reforms appeared successful (at the price of increased national debt): at the end of the 1940s there was almost full employment . In September 1949 and early 1950, among other things, the government devalued the pound . In July 1944, representatives from 44 states agreed on the Bretton Woods system , a system of fixed exchange rates. This political foreign exchange market intervention revived the export economy; However, it was unpopular in Great Britain in view of the former importance of the pound as the leading currency of the entire world (those who had assets in pounds suffered a devaluation, which can also be received as a partial expropriation). Devaluations can lead to "imported inflation" (the higher a country's import quota, the more likely it is).

In 1947 India (until then British India ) left the Empire. This began a decolonization process in which Great Britain gradually lost its remaining colonies and also lost influence within the Commonwealth . Also in 1947, the United Kingdom joined the GATT at the urging of the USA . From 1948 onwards it received help from the Marshall Plan . In the same year it gave up the administration of the mandated area of ​​Palestine and gave Ceylon and Burma, now Myanmar , independence. In terms of foreign policy, Great Britain leaned on the USA, although it still saw itself as a world power . The Labor government ( Attlee cabinet ), especially Foreign Minister Ernest Bevin , pushed ahead with the establishment of NATO in 1949 in order to tie the USA institutionally to Western Europe as a protective power against the Soviet Union.

On February 20, 1948, the dual right to vote for owners and academics (= the possibility of voting in two different constituencies) was abolished; since then the principle of one man, one vote has applied .

Conservative Governments (1951–1964)

When the Conservatives re-appointed Prime Minister Winston Churchill, they left social legislation untouched and only withdrew the nationalization of the iron and steel industry. Years of economic boom followed with high growth rates in residential construction. The coronation celebrations for Elisabeth II in 1953 stood for overcoming the restrictions of the post-war period, which had lasted longer on the island than in the Federal Republic of Germany, for example with food rationing . The 1950s and early 60s were characterized by an economic upswing that helped broad sections of the population to prosper. The disputes between employers and employees reached an extremely low level for the UK.

Prime Minister Anthony Eden embarked on the adventure of occupying the Suez Canal area together with France in 1956 , but it became clear that no policy against joint pressure from the Soviet Union and the USA was possible. Eden resigned and Harold Macmillan succeeded him in January 1957. His government granted independence to numerous colonies ( Ghana in 1957 , British Somaliland and Nigeria in 1960 , later Sierra Leone , Somalia , Tanzania , Uganda , Kenya , Malaysia , Cyprus and Jamaica ). Britain was one of the countries that beginning in 1960 the founded EFTA . From the end of March 1960, US President Kennedy asked the British government to join the EEC. On August 9, 1961, the Macmillan government submitted an application to join the EEC (now the EU ), which French President Charles de Gaulle surprisingly rejected on January 14, 1963. MacMillan's successor, Alec Douglas-Home , narrowly defeated Labor leader Harold Wilson in the general election on October 15, 1964 .

Britain ignited its first nuclear test on October 3, 1952 , making it a nuclear power . As part of its nuclear program, it built up a nuclear industry , which among other things built twelve Magnox reactors (list here ); these were put into operation from 1956 to 1962 and shut down from 1988 to 2003. Fourteen medium-sized EGR reactors that have been active to date (2017) went into operation between 1976 and 1989; Sizewell B is the only pressurized water reactor in the UK.

From Inflation to the Winter of Discontent (1964–1979)

Wilson soon faced significant inflation and the resulting persistent sterling weakness and spike in unemployment , which he could not control by monitoring prices or restricting immigration from Commonwealth countries. In addition, British exports fell noticeably, which was due, among other things, to incorrect product and price policies by many companies, especially state-owned corporations. High taxes, high wage agreements and unions that were more likely to strike again put additional strain on the economy. Despite international support actions by the central banks , he was finally forced to devalue the pound by 14.3 percent in 1967 , which proved the currency speculators right.

In other areas of politics, Wilson achieved lasting reforms with the abolition of the death penalty , reform of the House of Lords and laws against racial discrimination . He had to give up considering restricting the power of the unions under their pressure, given their great influence over the Labor Party.

The change of government to the conservatives under Edward Heath did not bring economic détente. The release of the pound exchange rate on June 23, 1972 was widely welcomed in Great Britain.

Membership in the EC from 1973 initially had hardly any economic effects. When the energy supply ran into difficulties in January 1974, the three-day week had to be introduced at times. The oil crisis had little impact on the national budget, as Great Britain benefited from the price increase through its oil fields in the North Sea. Further difficulties brought the government a miners strike by the NUM , so that Heath decided to dissolve the House of Commons. The elections on February 28, 1974 , however, did not result in a clear majority; Harold Wilson formed a Labor cabinet (as a minority government) and held elections in October 1974 (which Labor narrowly won).

Neither he nor James Callaghan , who became party chairman and prime minister (and previously foreign minister) after Wilson's surprising resignation on March 16, 1976, could solve the problems with price and wage controls. Inflation peaked at 26.9% in August 1975, and unemployment rose in 1977 to 1.3 million people, a high since 1939. This combination of inflation and lack of economic growth, known as stagflation , was an internationally widespread phenomenon at the time. The strike Winter ( Winter of Discontent ) 1978/79 led to the defeat Callaghan in the general election on 28 March 1979 . From this the Conservative Party emerged victorious; Margaret Thatcher became Prime Minister.

In Northern Ireland during the boom of the postwar long peace had returned. In view of the worsening economic situation and stimulated by the civil rights movement in the USA, Catholic separatism formed again from the mid-1960s . Soon there were acts of terrorism on both sides as well as tough military action by the British security forces and, from 1969, the British Army . A state of emergency was declared on August 3, 1971 ; shortly afterwards the government in London took over the direct administration of Northern Ireland (details here ).

The Thatcher Era (1979–1990)

Margaret Thatcher

Margaret Thatcher , the first female prime minister in the United Kingdom, based her economic policy on USA President Ronald Reagan with a very business-friendly economic policy and fought against the power of the trade unions. As one of the first decisions, the Thatcher administration lowered the top tax rate from 83 to 60 percent in 1979. Initially, inflation rose further to 22 percent in May 1980, but fell into the single-digit percentage range by 1982.

After the victory in the Falklands War in 1982, Thatcher had enough support in parliament and in the population to victoriously end a year-long miners' strike under the leader Arthur Scargill on March 3, 1985 and then to severely curtail the rights of the trade unions through severe legislation. With her tough crackdown on internal party critics, the prime minister had created numerous enemies within the conservative party, and inflation began to rise again. With the introduction of a new local tax system , the poll tax , resistance against Thatcher formed and forced her to resign on November 22, 1990. This ended the longest running term of prime minister of Great Britain since the Napoleonic Wars after eleven years.

Her conservative successor, John Major , remained in her shadow, was at times the most unpopular post-war prime minister due to inflation and unemployment (14 percent in survey results) and suffered due to scandals in his government, illegal arms deals and failures in dealing with the BSE cattle epidemic and reforms in the Labor Party - led by Neil Kinnock , John Smith and Tony Blair - lost to New Labor on May 1, 1997 (worst result since 1832). For the first time since the beginning of the 20th century, the Liberals again had a significant number of seats in the lower house.

New Labor (1997-2010)

Tony Blair

In the Thatcher era, there was a real decline in Labor. The leadership's resolute left-wing course had driven liberal members out of the party.

Tony Blair introduced job creation programs and minimum wages on the one hand , but he also pursued industry- friendly deregulation , including greater independence for the Bank of England . He also made himself popular through his quick reaction to the death (1997) of the popular Princess Diana , the queen of hearts , especially since the royal family exercised a restraint that was strange to the people.

One of the greatest successes during his first term in office was the signing of the Good Friday Agreement , which significantly defused the Northern Ireland conflict. Negotiations for an agreement had already begun under Blair's predecessor, John Major. It was finally signed on April 10, 1998. On November 26th of the same year, Blair became the first British Prime Minister ever to address the Irish Parliament. While many parts of the agreement are still a long way off, the ceasefire agreements and new political structures for Northern Ireland have significantly improved prospects for long-term peace in Northern Ireland.

There were also major constitutional reforms. A human rights catalog was introduced in 1998; regional parliaments were established in Wales and Scotland , and titles of hereditary nobility no longer gave entitlement to entry into the House of Lords in most cases . However, the regional parliaments have only limited powers. The Scottish Parliament may legislate to a certain extent, but the Wales and Northern Ireland Parliaments are only allowed to freely use the budget provided by the UK central government. In 2000 , a new regional structure for Greater London was created and a Freedom of Information Act was passed.

In Kosovo -Crisis 1999 Blair played a leading role: After the Labor Party, the weakness of the Tory government during the Bosnian war had criticized, he called for a clear action by NATO against Slobodan Milosevic . He convinced US President Clinton to deploy ground troops in Kosovo if necessary. He also emphasized his will to work intensively in the European Union, but he did not go along with the European Monetary Union .

After the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001 , Blair took a firm stand on the side of the United States and helped form an international coalition to intervene in Afghanistan , which included British troops. He supported US President Bush's plans for a possible attack on Iraq under dictator Saddam Hussein from the start . The war was fiercely controversial both internationally and at home. Blair's reasoning was based on the claim that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction and had violated UN resolutions , since the overthrow of a dictatorship in international law is not a reason for war . Britain took 46,000 soldiers, a third of the total strength of the army, the Iraq war of 2003 part. After the fall of Saddam Hussein, the troops were primarily stationed in southern Iraq.

When the existence of weapons of mass destruction was not confirmed after the war, Blair came under domestic political pressure. He was accused of having massively exaggerated the available evidence of an Iraqi threat. The controversy continues to this day.

Domestically, after the election victory, Blair first tackled the fulfillment of his promises regarding public services. His government raised taxes to increase spending on education and health care. He tried to reform the structure of the health system and gave hospitals greater financial autonomy.

After the death of the arms expert and advisor to the British government, David Kelly, on July 17, 2003, calls for resignation from within and from the opposition became louder and louder. On January 29, 2004 , Lord Justice Brian Hutton, in charge of the investigation into the circumstances of the death, published the final report of his work . There the question was also discussed whether Tony Blair gave the order to reveal the name of the bioweapons expert. Tony Blair and the public interpreted the final report as a complete discharge, while the BBC's Director General and Artistic Director immediately resigned.

There was also controversy over tuition fees . A law allowing increases put Blair on the verge of a loss in the House of Commons on January 27, 2004 . In April 2004 , he also announced a referendum on the EU constitution . After the rejection of the draft constitution by France and the Netherlands, however, he withdrew this announcement.

In the general election on May 5, 2005 , Blair was re-elected.

On July 7, 2005, there were four bomb attacks in three underground trains and one bus in the British capital . The police and the British government assumed that the perpetrators are very likely to be part of the Islamic terrorist organization Al-Qaeda and that they were British citizens with Pakistani roots (“homegrown terrorists”). Over fifty people died in the attacks; more than 600 were injured.

On June 27, 2007, Blair resigned from Prime Minister's office. His successor was the former Chancellor of the Exchequer Gordon Brown , who had also been elected Labor leader a few days earlier.

Exchange rate euro - pound sterling

In summer / autumn 2007 a financial crisis began in many industrialized countries . In addition, a long period came to an end in Great Britain (from around 1992 to around autumn 2008) in which the financial and banking sectors expanded unusually (the number of employees there tripled). During this crisis, banks in the USA and Great Britain cut many jobs; some merged.

The external value of the pound fell sharply from autumn 2007 to spring 2009 (at its peak by around a third against the euro; see chart). It is true that this increased the competitiveness of British goods and services abroad; but it also meant that imported waiting lines became noticeably more expensive; the rate of inflation rose.

After the lost British general election in 2010 and the failure of negotiations with the Liberal Democratic Party , Brown resigned on May 11, 2010 from his posts as Prime Minister and Labor Party leader.

Conservative victory and EU referendum (from 2010)

David Cameron

A coalition government was formed under MP David Cameron . You took office at the end of a global economic crisis, which many industrialized countries tried to counteract with a significant increase in national debt. The UK has less industry than other equally wealthy industrialized countries. GB has had high revenues from North Sea oil since the late 1970s ; however, it has not been a net exporter since around 2004.

According to estimates by the International Monetary Fund for 2013, Great Britain is the sixth largest economy in the world in terms of gross domestic product (GDP) and the third largest in Europe, behind Germany and France. With a gross domestic product per capita of 39,567 US dollars, Great Britain ranks 23rd in the world, ahead of Italy and Spain.

Britain did not adopt the euro as a currency. The euro is the common currency in 19 EU countries (" Eurozone "). In view of the Greek financial crisis and the euro crisis , which has been publicly known since autumn 2009 , it has some advantages for the UK to have its own currency . In 2009 the inflation rate in the UK was given as 2.1 percent; 2010 with 3.3 percent; 2011 with almost 5 percent (maximum value 5.2% from September 2010 to September 2011). The largest strikes in more than 30 years, on November 30, 2011, show the expectations of British workers for the government to maintain the purchasing power of pensions. In 2010, the UK's trade deficit was around 154.4 billion US dollars: exports of 406 billion US dollars compared with imports of around 560 billion US dollars.

After the general election in 2010 Labor lost a majority to the opposition Tories, which, however, could not achieve an absolute majority of seats, whereupon the chairman of the Tories, David Cameron, entered into a coalition with the Liberal Democrats under Nick Clegg, which was unusual for British standards, and was elected on May 11th Finally in 2010 the new British Prime Minister, Clegg Deputy Prime Minister.

In the general election on May 7, 2015 , the Conservatives, led by Cameron, almost won an absolute majority of the parliamentary seats (with a 36.9% share of the vote), contrary to all prognoses and opinion polls before the election. Cameron was able to form an all-conservative government after the election.

Theresa May

On September 18, 2014, a referendum was held on whether Scotland would remain in the United Kingdom and its membership in the United Kingdom was confirmed. In a referendum on whether the United Kingdom should remain in the European Union on June 23, 2016, 51.9 percent of those who voted voted in favor of leaving the European Union . David Cameron announced his resignation until October. After all, on July 13, his party colleague Theresa May took over government affairs with the May I cabinet .

It initiated the withdrawal process in accordance with Article 50 of the Treaty on European Union on March 29, 2017 by means of a written notification to the European Council . After the contractually stipulated two-year negotiation period, the exit is expected in March 2019. New elections to the House of Commons were scheduled for June 8, 2017 , in which the conservatives lost the votes and the absolute majority in parliament. May then formed her second cabinet , which as a minority government is dependent on the support of the Northern Irish Democratic Unionist Party .

Boris Johnson (2019)

After Theresa May lost several votes in the House of Commons, Boris Johnson was elected party leader of the Conservatives and appointed Prime Minister on July 24, 2019. On August 28, 2019, the Queen put the House of Commons on leave for five weeks at Johnson's request . On September 24, the Supreme Court ruled that the extended leave of absence was null and void. But in the 2019 general election , Johnson led the Conservatives to their greatest electoral victory since the 1980s under Margaret Thatcher . Nothing stood in the way of leaving the EU on January 31, 2020. On February 1, 2020, Great Britain left the European Union as a member. Within a so-called transition phase until December 31, 2020, future relations between the European Union and Great Britain are to be shaped through negotiations.

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Charles Wheeler : The Road to War , 1st Great Britain, BBC, 1989
  2. ^ Murray Barber: V2: The A4 Rocket from Peenemunde to Redstone , Verlag Crecy Publishing, 2017, ISBN 9781906537531
  3. ↑ spiegel.de August 13, 1952: With all thanks
  4. ↑ spiegel.de April 20, 1950: Triumph of the Commonwealth
  5. ↑ The library of the British House of Commons has published a document which documents fluctuations or inflation since 1750: PDF at www.parliament.uk ( Memento from July 20, 2007 on WebCite )
  6. ↑ What was on February 20, 1948 , on www.chroniknet.de
  7. ↑ see also Decolonization of Africa # States after the year of their release into independence
  8. ↑ Der Spiegel 18/1961, pp. 74–76: Efta at the end
  9. ^ Gordon Brown's resignation speech in full. The Guardian , May 11, 2010.
  10. ↑ Pensions strike disrupts schools and ambulance service . In: BBC , December 1, 2011. Retrieved May 30, 2013. 
  11. ^ Economy in Great Britain . statista.com. Retrieved May 30, 2013.
  12. ↑ Brexit - but without Cameron. Referendum result. In: tagesschau.de. Tagesschau (ARD) , June 24, 2016, accessed on June 24, 2016 .
  13. ↑ 'No turning back' on Brexit as Article 50 triggered. BBC News, March 29, 2017, accessed March 29, 2017 .
  14. ↑ General election 2017: MPs back plans for 8 June poll. BBC News , April 19, 2017, accessed April 19, 2017 .
  15. ↑ General election 2017: SNP MPs abstain in Commons vote. BBC News, April 19, 2017, accessed April 19, 2017 .
  16. ↑ Great Britain embarks on a risky adventure , In: NZZ.ch, accessed on July 23, 2019.
  17. ↑ FAZ.net August 28, 2019 / Jochen Buchsteiner: A rogue who thinks evil
  18. ↑ Judgment (on the application of Miller) (Appellant) v The Prime Minister (Respondent) Cherry and others (Respondents) v Advocate General for Scotland (Appellant) (Scotland) - Judgment given on 24 September 2019, Heard on 17, 18 and September 19, 2019 (judgment in full), supremecourt.uk (accessed September 24, 2019).
  19. ↑ EU exit on January 31st - What is in the Brexit Treaty? Accessed January 31, 2020 (German).

literature

Audio documentation

  • Eyewitness: A History of the Twentieth Century in Sound (BBC Audio History)

Web links