As many Prime Ministers as you can count ……

It has become one of those throw away comments much loved by the media that since 2016 we do seem to have had a lot of Prime Ministers, which is often accompanied with a comparison to some of our European neighbours who change theirs with monotonous regularity.*

1979

And it is true that in that decade we have had five, with one lasting just 44 days which occasioned the “Liz Truss lettuce”.

1923

Now none of this is contested but does hide the uncomfortable history that during the last century some governments were almost as short lived.  

The second post war Labour Government which won the 1950 General Election survived with a majority of just five from February 1950 till the October of 1951.  

All the more remarkable when the first post war Labour Government came to power with a huge majority and established the National Health Service. 

Just over twenty years later in 1974 there were two elections in the February and October, while the Conservative Prime Minister, Sir Alexander Douglas- Home who succeeded Harold Macmillan in the October of 1963 lasted just a year.

Of course, there are sound political reasons why those changes of power occurred and once you delve into the history the sleek and shallow observations are just that ….. sleek but shallow.

And if you wanted to go back to almost the beginning of the 20th century that history can offer up a similar set of Prime Ministers who held office for just a short period.

1929

David Lloyd George, Coalition, lasted from 1918 till he was ousted by a Tory Party coup in October 1922.  His successor Andrew Bonar Law, Conservative was replaced by Stanley Baldwin, Conservative in May 1923.

But Baldwin lost the 1924 General Election to the first Labour Government led by Ramsey MacDonald whose administration lasted for just eleven months. 

Baldwin was returned to power and managed a creditable five years before he was defeated in the 1929 General Election by Labour who were derailed by the financial crisis of 1929.  Unable to secure the budget cuts he wanted and in the face of a Labour Party split he formed a National Government winning the 1931 General Election.

All of which means that by my reckoning in the seven years that spanned most of the 1920s we managed to clock up six changes of Prime Minister, starting with the Lloyd George Coalition Government and ending with the Coalition Government of Ramsay MacDonald.

Pictures, Election Posters from 1924-1979

*Theresa May, 2016-2019, Boris Johnson, 2019-2022, Liz Truss, 2022-2022, Rishi Sunak, 2022-2024, Keir Starmer, 2024-2026