Conservative Party (UK)

The principal center-right party of the United Kingdom, rooted in the Tory tradition and formally named Conservative since the 1830s.

Overview

The Conservatives descend from the Tory party of the late seventeenth century, defenders of crown and church who learned to survive reform. Sir Robert Peel issued the Tamworth Manifesto in 1834, accepting parliamentary change, and Disraeli later married the party to one nation idealism and empire. The twentieth century brought Baldwin and Churchill, the postwar settlement, and then the free market revolution of Margaret Thatcher after 1979, privatization and union reform that redraw the economy. John Major, David Cameron, Theresa May, Boris Johnson, Liz Truss, and Rishi Sunak held power almost continuously after 2010 until the 2024 defeat. The party is one of the oldest electoral organizations in the world.