Three-Party Politics, 1922–31

The Coalition’s collapse inaugurated a period of three-party competition in conditions of near-universal suffrage. The Conservatives started with several advantages: the fragmentation of the Liberals, the immaturity of Labour and the disappearance of the southern Irish seats from Westminster after the formation of the Irish Free State. They would, indeed, dominate inter-war politics, but to suggest a continuous Tory hegemony is to impose a false unity on the period. After 1931 Britain was virtually a one-party state, under a Tory-dominated National Government with massive majorities and clear policies. In the 1920s the Conservatives were less secure.