Word: kinnock
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Political analysts are in near unanimity that Kinnock will soon have to relinquish his leadership post -- perhaps as early as this week. In the meantime, Kinnock, who had struck a statesmanlike demeanor on the campaign trail, was less than gracious in defeat. "Now the Conservatives will continue with the decline," he said. "The whole country deserves better...
...weeks long, did little to relieve the malaise. The Tories' performance was abysmally lackluster, their strategy poorly conceived. A day before calling the election, Major unveiled a budget that failed to provide creative ideas on such important domestic issues as investment, job training or health-care funding. That enabled Kinnock to put Major on the defensive from the start. Moreover, despite his personal popularity, Major proved a disappointing campaigner, often rambling on with coma-inducing lassitude; occasionally his cheerful wading into the crowd met with heckling, and on two occasions he was struck by eggs. Former Tory campaign director Brendan...
...strategy of the Labour effort was far plainer. Using the slogan "It's Time for Change," the party played its trump card -- the recession -- to good advantage. Labourites attacked the Tories for insufficient school funding, delays in the care offered by the National Health Service, and high unemployment. Though Kinnock displays a sharp tongue in House of Commons debates, he has a penchant for obscure verbal meanderings when campaigning; a platoon of media advisers and spin doctors limited Kinnock's appearances and oversaw his every move...
Less successful were attempts to convince voters that the party had shifted from radical socialism to more centrist policies. During the campaign, Kinnock dismissed some of his old positions as "errors of judgment," among them his insistence on unilateral nuclear disarmament and the renationalization of some state assets sold off by the Conservatives. Why the switch? "We lost three elections," said Jack Cunningham, Labour's campaign coordinator. "That is good enough reason to change policy." Many voters were left doubting Labour's sincerity. "Labour jettisoned its ideological baggage without acquiring any new ideas distinctively its own," says Anthony King...
...Britain refused to follow the European Community's lead. The recession was as bad there as it was on the Continent, and British voters were just as disgruntled. Even so, at the end of a four-week election campaign, they still found the Labour Party and its leader Neil Kinnock unconvincing. They stuck with the Conservative Party of Prime Minister John Major, giving it a majority of 21 seats in the 651-seat House of Commons. The Conservatives took 41.9% of the popular vote, a slight decrease from the 42.3% they won in 1987, when Margaret Thatcher last...