February 1974 United Kingdom general election

February 1974 United Kingdom general election

28 February 1974
All 635 seats in the House of Commons 318 seats needed for a majority
Turnout	78.8%, 6.8%
First party Second party   Leader Harold Wilson Edward Heath Party Labour Conservative Leader's seat Huyton Sidcup Last election 288 seats, 43.1% 330 seats, 46.4% Seats before 287 325 Seats won 301 297 Seat change 14 28 Popular vote 11,645,616 11,872,180 Percentage 37.2% 37.9% Swing 5.9% 8.5%   Third party Fourth party   Leader Jeremy Thorpe William Wolfe Party Liberal SNP Leader's seat North Devon Stood in West Lothian (lost) Last election 6 seats, 7.5% 1 seat, 1.1% Seats before 11 2 Seats won 14 7 Seat change 3 5 Popular vote 6,059,519 633,180 Percentage 19.3% 2.0% Swing 11.8% 0.9%
Colours show the winning party—as shown in § Results
Composition of the House of Commons after the election
Prime Minister before election Edward Heath Conservative Prime Minister after election Harold Wilson Labour

A general election was held on 28 February 1974 to elect all 635 members of the House of Commons of the United Kingdom. The election ended in a hung parliament as no party had a majority. Nobody agreed to start a coalition, so Labour had to start a minority government (as they had won the most seats), and Harold Wilson became Prime Minister.

It is very hard to run a government if the party has no majority, and so the House of Commons agreed to hold another general election in October. This was done so that a party could win a majority.

References

• Butler, David; Kavanagh, Dennis (1974), The British General Election of February 1974, Macmillan, ISBN 0333172973
• Sandbrook, Dominic (2010), State of Emergency: The Way We Were: Britain, 1970–1974, Allen Lane, ISBN 9781846140310
• Taylor, Andrew (1984), The Politics of the Yorkshire Miners, London: Croom Helm, ISBN 0-7099-2447-X