Civil Partnership Act 2004

Major acts

National Lottery Act 1993

Licensed a body to run a National Lottery

Council Tax 1992 ( Муниципальный налог)

Replaced the highly unpopular Poll Tax

John Major was raised in Brixton. After leaving school at sixteen he did not attend university. Instead he came to politics at a young age as an active Young Conservative in Brixton and stood as a candidate for Lambeth Council aged only 21, winning the seat and becoming chairman of the Housing Committee (председателем Жилищного комитета). He stood for Parliament twice in 1974 in St Pancras, losing both times before winning Huntingdonshire in 1979.

Once He became a ministerial assistant (помощник министра) in 1981 and then a Minister himself in 1985. Entering Cabinet in 1987 as Chief Secretary to the Treasury (главного секретаря Казначейства) he won the admiration and respect of his colleagues due to his ability to keep expenditure (расходы) down. He was then promoted to Foreign Secretary (был назначен министром иностранных дел) in 1989 and Chancellor of the Exchequer (министр финансов) soon after that.

Major became Prime Minister and tried to reconcile (примирить) both party and country.

Major won the 1992 General Election. After this election, however, his fortunes began to change. Five months into the new parliament, Major was forced to refuse (отказаться)a flagship part of his economic policy, membership of the Exchange Rate Mechanism.

The rest of his time as Prime Minister, Major suffered from continued attacks from his own party and Cabinet on Europe that played a role in destabilising the government.

In addition to this (В дополнение к этому), the Major government was the subject of a number of press stories about infidelity and poor moral behavior (неверности и плохого морального поведения) both within the Cabinet and wider party.

After leaving the ERM, the economy picked up and under Major the beginning of Britain’s longest period of continuous economic growth began. Major also began work engaging with the IRA to work towards a peaceful end to the conflict in Northern Ireland, his work there laying the foundations for the Good Friday Agreement (Соглашение Страстной пятницы) in 1998.

Tony Blair (2 May 1997 - 27 June 2007)

Political party - Labour

Major acts

Civil Partnership Act 2004

Allowed legal recognition of civil partnership relationship between two people of the same sex.

Tony Blair was born in 1953 in Scotland. He attended the University of Oxford and read law, afterwards becoming a barrister (адвокат). He joined the Labour Party in 1975. Brown was also elected in 1983.

Blair assumed several Shadow Cabinet roles before being made Shadow Home Secretary in 1992. Blair won the subsequent (последубщей) leadership contest, having made an agreement with Brown that if he did not stand, he would become a powerful chancellor(канцлер) should Labour win the next election.

It was little surprise when Labour won the 1997 general election. Blair became Prime Minister on 2 May 1997.

Significant constitutional change happened quickly, with Scottish and Welsh devolution, reform to the House of Lords, the Human Rights Act and a Freedom of Information Act. One of Blair’s biggest achievements came in 1998 when the Northern Irish peace process really got underway with the Good Friday Agreement (Соглашением Страстной пятницы). Limited military involvement in Sierra Leone in 2000 shored up the democratically elected government.

Thanks to Blair’s leadership, a healthy economy Labour won the 2001 general election with another landslide, this time 167 seats.

In 2006, the Israel-Lebanon war saw a sizeable Labour rebellion against Blair over his reluctance to criticise Israel and his continued support for Bush. He resigned as Prime Minister on 27 June 2007.

Gordon Brown (27 June 2007 - 11 May 2010)

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