1997 all over again? The state we’re in today is even more precarious

A tired, scandal-hit administration on the brink of conceding power after eviscerating public services and the underlying economy… the parallels with the Major/Blair years are clear, says Will Hutton. But so, too, are the worrying and profound differences

Tony Blair waves to his supporters upon his arrival at Downing Street, after winning the 1997 general election against John Major (AFP/Getty Images)

2024 has eerie parallels with 1997. Then, a politically out-of-time Tory government was decaying before our eyes. The triumvirate at its head – John Major, Michael Heseltine and Ken Clarke – may not have believed in the pure milk of Thatcherism, nor its bastard child, Euroscepticism, but they were trapped in a party already beginning to lose its head to an increasingly confident hard right.

The wounds and inequalities in British society had to be healed and the alarming run-down of our public services addressed – but little of that preoccupied the right, obsessed then as now with Europe. Nor did they care much about an economy that was going nowhere. Even the British state and democracy seemed mired in misconduct and scandal. Reflecting the hunger for change, Tony Blair would sweep to power.

Twenty-seven years later, the parallels are obvious, and after last week’s local and mayoral elections, so seems the sequel – Keir Starmer repeating Blair’s success.