The 70s2012

[talking about the 1979 General Election]

Dominic Sandbrook:
On the morning of the election, The Sun ran an enormous front-page editorial urging its readers, for the first time in the paper's history, to vote Conservative. "This is D-Day - D for Decision. The first day of the rest of our lives. The Sun is not a Tory paper - we are proud of our working-class readership - but the choice you have to make today is quite simply the choice between freedom and shackles. Freedom to work, with or without a union card. Freedom to rent your home, or buy it. Freedom to live life *your* way." As the results came in, it quickly became clear that Margaret Thatcher would indeed be Britain's first woman prime minister. Her victory wasn't a landslide, but with 339 seats, she'd secured a solid majority of 43. And the rule-book of British politics had been re-written: in future, anyone wanting to win an election would need to appeal, not to the trade-union barons, but to the readers of The Sun.