After 18 years in opposition the Labour Party recognised that something about them needed to change. They needed to appeal to an electorate they had plainly lost touch with. Despite leading consistently in every poll during the general election of 1992 they still failed to achieve a majority. This was a crushing disappointment to the party and it was clearly time to take a new direction.
John Smith was the elected leader after Neil Kinnock stepped down. Kinnock had already begun a policy review and made many inroads into making the party electable again. Smith picked up the challenge but his tenure as leader was cut tragically short when he passed away suddenly. This opened the door for Tony Blair, Gordon Brown, Harriet Harmon and Margaret Beckett. The other architect in the background, and not an MP, was Alistair Campbell.
Campbell was the driving force behind the party’s media dealings and its messages. He was the original “Spin Doctor” and was determined to try and bring positive messages to an outward hostile print media which, at the time, was considered to have a large influence on the British public, He is still important within the media and contributes via his work on the www.theneweuropean.co.uk.
This success for the Labour party was to see them in power until 2015 before they were defeated by a global financial crisis and Conservative/Liberal Democrat coalition.