🚨 Want to know more about Sir John Major's life after Downing Street? 🔗 Then check out his website which includes lots of post-1997 material: johnmajorarchive.org.uk 🪙 It's a treasure trove!

✍🏻 'Liz Truss and Rishi Sunak are, despite their different economic and political approaches, competing over who gets to be crowned the true heir to Maggie.' 🗓️ Eleni Courea on 4 August 2022 about Margaret Thatcher's role in the Tory leadership contest. www.politico.eu/article/uk-p...

Margaret Thatcher’s ghost looms over Liz Truss and Rishi Sunak

Tory leadership hopefuls both want to tap into Maggie’s legacy, in a major shift for the Conservatives.

politico.eu

🗓️ Stanley Baldwin was born on this day, 3 August, in 1867. 😊 So it's a good day to be thinking about the presentation I'll be giving on his life after Downing Street in just a few weeks. 💡 I'll be arguing we need radically to revisit our views of his ex-Premiership.

🗣️ 'Our objective should be that this great waterway should be open and free to all nations, and should not be used, as it might be used, as a method of blackmail for levying money out of other nations.' 🗓️ Earl (Clement) Attlee on this day, 2 August, in 1956 on the Suez Canal.

🚨 July 2026 update on ex-PMs' parliamentary activity. 6️⃣ 6 interventions from Rishi Sunak who has now overtaken Gordon Brown 1️⃣ 1 intervention from Theresa May 0️⃣ No interventions by David Cameron 🤔 How soon before Sir Keir Starmer makes his first intervention?

✍🏻 'I have been distraught about the situation in Bosnia and Croatia for months.' 🗓️ Margaret Thatcher to John Major on 30 July 1992 when she wrote advising him of her correspondence with Douglas Hurd and of her own efforts to try to help some of the refugees.

Peter Just@expremiers.bsky.social · 7d ago

✍ ‘No-one with a conscience can let this go on.’ 🗓️ Margaret Thatcher to Douglas Hurd on this day, 30 July, in 1992, in a handwritten letter about Bosnia. 🚨 She also wrote to John Major about the issue on the same day.

✍ ‘No-one with a conscience can let this go on.’ 🗓️ Margaret Thatcher to Douglas Hurd on this day, 30 July, in 1992, in a handwritten letter about Bosnia. 🚨 She also wrote to John Major about the issue on the same day.

✍ 'She characteristically interrupted the proceedings'. 📘 To mark the 1st anniversary of the publication of 'Margaret Thatcher: Life After Downing Street', the full version of our favourite anecdote - Margaret Thatcher being entirely herself in South Korea in 1992.

🇯🇵 Interested in Japan and the role of its former Prime Ministers? 📘 Then check out Hugo Dobson, Karin Narita and Caroline Rose's (brilliant) 'Former Prime Ministers in Japan' from @brisunipress.bsky.social. 🔗 bristoluniversitypress.co.uk/former-prime...

🗣️ 'It was just sixteen years ago that the Labour Party formed a Government, and that I was Prime Minister. I recall that at that time I received more condolences than congratulations.' 🚨 Earl (Clement) Attlee speaking on this day, 27 July, in 1961.

📰 'Andy Burnham needs to stop talking about Thatcher', according to Rishi Sunak in July 2026. 🗞️ 'I will be the heir to Margaret Thatcher': 'I am a Thatcherite, I am running as a Thatcherite and I will govern as a Thatcherite,' according to Rishi Sunak in July 2022.

🚨 If the number of living former Prime Ministers is causing security issues, pity the poor Foreign Office officials - and in other Government Departments (to say nothing for No. 10/No. 10s) - who are likely to be having work generated for them by our current ex-PMs. www.thetimes.com/article/45bf...

Prince Harry’s security review delayed as nine former PMs need protection

The Duke of Sussex was promised a risk assessment last year, but was still waiting in June as officials struggled to cope with record demand

thetimes.com

🗣️ 'It is not our habit in this country to abolish old institutions - we merely transform them slightly, and change them into new uses.' 🗓️ Earl (Clement) Attlee speaking about public schools on this day, 24 July, in a debate on educational policy.

🗣️ ‘When I met Gorbachev, which I had longed to do, the only picture was of mum trying to smooth down my fringe. I was incandescent.’ 🗓️ Carol Thatcher speaking about this incident reported on this day, 23 July, in 1993 when Margaret Thatcher met Mikhail Gorbachev.

🗣️ 'Notwithstanding all the calumny which has been poured upon us, the conduct of the House of Lords on the subject of the Irish Church does them the highest honour.' 🗓️ Earl Russell on this day 22 July in 1869 on the Irish Church Bill which disestablished the church in Ireland.

🗣️ 'It is quite frustrating that female politicians always get compared to Margaret Thatcher, whereas male politicians don’t get compared to Ted Heath'. 🗓️ So reported the press on this day, 22 July, in 2022 about Liz Truss' response to being compared to Margaret Thatcher.

🚨 With Sir Keir Starmer about to become a member of what Harold Wilson described as 'the most distinguished club in Britain - the Society of Former Prime Ministers', a reminder that 'Margaret Thatcher: Life After Downing Street' provides a framework for understanding what his life might now be like.

🗣️ 'As the Prime Minister now seems to be asking the questions, I wonder whether it would solve the problem if she and my right hon. Friend the Leader of the Opposition changed places?' 🗓️ Jim Callaghan, making a Point of Order, on this day, 19 July, in 1984.

📋 On this day, 18 July, in 1978, Harold Wilson asked a written question on the implementation of the Helsinki Final Act. 🚨 It is one of only 77 written questions asked by ex-Prime Ministers from Sir Winston Churchill's resignation in 1955 through to the end of June 2026.

🗣️ 'Large parts of our press are now the worst in the world. Those of us who see a great deal of the world in our travels recognise that full well.' 🗓️ So said Ted Heath on this day, 17 July, in 1995, on a statement on privacy and media intrusion.

📘 Delighted to attend the launch of my former boss Iain Dale's 'Have I said too much?' yesterday. 😊 Honoured to find myself amongst Diana, Princess of Wales, Margaret Thatcher, and Dame Shirley Bassey in the index. 📘 Politico's was - and remains - one of my favourite jobs.

🥳 It's a year today since the launch of 'Margaret Thatcher: Life After Downing Street' at the House of Lords. 🤔 Where have those 12 months gone?! 🙏🏻 Thanks to everyone who's bought the book. 😊 I hope you've enjoyed it.

🗣️ 'It is the people's turn to speak. It is their powers of which we are the custodians.' 🗓️ So concluded Margaret Thatcher her final speech in Parliament on the European Union, calling for a referendum on Maastricht, on this day, 14 July, in 1993.

🥁 With, of course, David Cameron joining Alec Douglas-Home as one of the two former Prime Ministers to return to office, both as Foreign Secretary, in the post-war period.

Peter Just@expremiers.bsky.social · 3w ago

🗓️ David Cameron became a former Prime Minister 10 years ago today, 13 July 2016. 📋Since then he's: 🗣️ Spoken in Parliament 5 times (post-2024 election) 💰 Got himself into trouble over his earnings 📘 Written his memoirs 🚨Done charity work on dementia 🌎 Travelled the world

🗓️ David Cameron became a former Prime Minister 10 years ago today, 13 July 2016. 📋Since then he's: 🗣️ Spoken in Parliament 5 times (post-2024 election) 💰 Got himself into trouble over his earnings 📘 Written his memoirs 🚨Done charity work on dementia 🌎 Travelled the world

🗣️ 'There was a bad custom in another place that Members who have held high office felt bound to speak for at least three-quarters of an hour.' 🗓️ Earl (Clement) Attlee on this day, 13 July, in 1965 speaking about the length of peers' speeches.

🗣️ 'Will my noble friend take away the message that soft words will not do? We need stern, calmly calculated, effective action.' 🗓️ So said Margaret Thatcher on this day, 12 July, in 1995 in her last parliamentary intervention on Bosnia.

🗣️ 'After the ceremony he made straight for Margaret Thatcher, who was in the audience, smiling happily, hand outstretched.' 🗓️ So remembered Betty Boothroyd of Nelson Mandela's Westminster Hall speech delivered 30 years ago today, 11 July 1996.

🗣️ 'He gave his willing assent to its repeal.' 🗓️ So said Earl Russell on this day, 11 July, in 1871 when speaking in support of repealing the Ecclesiastical Titles Act which he had introduced, as Lord John Russell, when Prime Minster in 1851.

👑 'on the doorstep in the cold to do some shadow conducting'. 😊 Delighted to see this find from The National Archives about The Queen Mother appear in the Times Diary recently.