The Manifesto Group of Labour MPs was a Parliamentary alliance of British Labour MPs led by Dr. Jesse Dickson Mabon

Dickson Mabon

Dr. Jesse Dickson "Dick" Mabon PC FRSA was a Scottish politician, physician and company director. He was the founder of The Manifesto Group of Labour MPs, an alliance of moderate MPs against the perceived leftward drift of the Labour Party in the 1970s. He was a Labour Co-operative MP until...

 (who preferred to be known as 'Dick Mabon'), who were opposed to what they perceived to be the leftward drift of the Labour Party in the 1970s.

History

In 1974, the hard-left Labour MP Ian Mikardo was elected as chairman of the Parliamentary Labour Party. Dickson Mabon was opposed to this, as he saw it as evidence of a drift towards the hard left. As a result, he launched the Manifesto Group of Labour MPs on 17 December 1974, to counterbalance it and to support Labour MPs who "did not regard defending the [Labour] Government as a betrayal of socialism".

Membership

Membership of the Manifesto Group included John Smith, Dennis Healey, George Robertson

George Robertson, Baron Robertson of Port Ellen

George Islay MacNeill Robertson, Baron Robertson of Port Ellen, is a British Labour Party politician who was the tenth Secretary General of the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation, between October 1999 and early January 2004; he succeeded Javier Solana in that position...

, Roy Hattersley

Roy Hattersley

Roy Sydney George Hattersley, Baron Hattersley is a British Labour politician, author and journalist from Sheffield. He served as Deputy Leader of the Labour Party from 1983 to 1992.-Early life:...

, Gerald Kaufman

Gerald Kaufman

Sir Gerald Bernard Kaufman is a British Labour Party politician, who has been a Member of Parliament since 1970, first for Manchester Ardwick, and then subsequently for Manchester Gorton...

 and Jack Cunningham

Jack Cunningham

John "Jack" Anderson Cunningham, Baron Cunningham of Felling, PC, DL is a British Labour Party politician, who was the Member of Parliament for Copeland from 1983 to 2005, and previously served in the Cabinet.-Early life:...

. It also included Brian Walden

Brian Walden

Alastair Brian Walden is a British journalist and broadcaster who was a Labour Member of Parliament for a decade. He is the father of actor Ben Walden....

, David Marquand

David Marquand

David Ian Marquand FBA, FRHistS, FRSA is a British academic and former Labour Party Member of Parliament .Born in Cardiff, Marquand was educated at Emanuel School, Magdalen College, Oxford, St. Antony’s College, Oxford, and at the University of California, Berkeley...

, John Horam

John Horam

John Rhodes Horam is a politician in the United Kingdom. He sat in the House of Commons for two separate periods between 1970 and 2010, as a member of three different political parties, latterly as the Conservative Party Member of Parliament for Orpington until 2010.-Early life:Horam was born in...

, Ian Wrigglesworth

Ian Wrigglesworth

Sir Ian William Wrigglesworth is Deputy Chairman of the Government's Regional Growth Fund Advisory Panel which is Chaired by Lord Heseltine and appointed by the Government to consider bids. He is Chief Executive of a Gateshead based commercial property investment company and is Chairman of the...

, the then Father of the House George Strauss

George Strauss

George Russell Strauss, Baron Strauss PC was a long-serving British Labour Party politician, who was a Member of Parliament for 46 years and was Father of the House of Commons from 1974 to 1979....

, the former Foreign Secretary Michael Stewart, Giles Radice and Phillip Whitehead

Phillip Whitehead

Phillip Whitehead, was a British Labour politician, television producer and writer.Born in Matlock Bath, Derbyshire, he was adopted by a local family, and attended Lady Manners School in Bakewell and Exeter College at Oxford University, where he obtained his BA .Whitehead apparently went to...

. It also included many members who were later to defect to the SDP, such as Roy Jenkins

Roy Jenkins

Roy Harris Jenkins, Baron Jenkins of Hillhead OM, PC was a British politician.The son of a Welsh coal miner who later became a union official and Labour MP, Roy Jenkins served with distinction in World War II. Elected to Parliament as a Labour member in 1948, he served in several major posts in...

, Bill Rogers, Shirley Williams and David Owen

David Owen

David Anthony Llewellyn Owen, Baron Owen CH PC FRCP is a British politician.Owen served as British Foreign Secretary from 1977 to 1979, the youngest person in over forty years to hold the post; he co-authored the failed Vance-Owen and Owen-Stoltenberg peace plans offered during the Bosnian War...

, including Dickson Mabon himself.

Organisation

Unlike the "Keep Calm" group of 1952, the Manifesto Group did not seek to reconcile opposing wings of the Labour Party, and instead rigorously opposed the left. Mabon ensured the electoral success of Manifesto members to senior positions in the Labour Party, such as the Cabinet and NEC. George Robertson, who later became Secretary of State for Defence

Secretary of State for Defence

The Secretary of State for Defence, popularly known as the Defence Secretary, is the senior Government of the United Kingdom minister in charge of the Ministry of Defence, chairing the Defence Council. It is a Cabinet position...

 under Prime Minister Tony Blair, said that Manifesto under Dickson Mabon organised elections better than the Tribune Group had ever managed to.

Success

Two of the Manifesto Group's greatest achievements were the election of moderate Labour MP Cledwyn Hughes as Chairman of the Parliamentary Labour Party, and the election of James Callaghan

James Callaghan

Leonard James Callaghan, Baron Callaghan of Cardiff, KG, PC , was a British Labour politician, who was Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 1976 to 1979 and Leader of the Labour Party from 1976 to 1980...

 as Labour leader in April 1976, who then became Prime Minister in the Labour-majority Parliament.

Replacement

Following the stated intention of many key members of Manifesto, including that of Dickson Mabon himself, to leave the Labour Party, it was replaced in 1980 by The Solidarity Group. The small majority of moderate Dennis Healey over Tony Benn in the Deputy Leadership Contest of September 1981, and the party votes for unilateral nuclear disarmament and withdrawal from the EEC, solidified their decision, and many left to form the SDP

Social Democratic Party (UK)

The Social Democratic Party was a political party in the United Kingdom that was created on 26 March 1981 and existed until 1988. It was founded by four senior Labour Party 'moderates', dubbed the 'Gang of Four': Roy Jenkins, David Owen, Bill Rodgers and Shirley Williams...

.