English general election, 1984 (Napoleon's World)

The English general election of 1984 was held on May 1, 1984, and saw a retaking of Parliament by the Tories after three years in the minority, defeating Prime Minister Andrew Brantle and elevating Conservative Leader Stephen Norrington to the office. The election revolved around the high unemployment and scandal-plagued Brantle Ministry, which by 1984 had eroded a crucial block of support due to the 1983-84 Public Service Workers of England strike. With minimal support from organized labor after his bungling of government negotiations with the strikers, the unenthusiastic Labour base, while showing better turnout than in the 1970's, was swamped by enthusiastic Tories going to the polls. The election was noted for its bitterness, divisiveness and the uncertainty going into the election in the preceding weeks due to the evenness of both parties at the polls - in that both were deeply unpopular with the populace at the time, even within their bases.

The election was famously covered by English Cable News (ECN) for the first time, which provided around-the-clock coverage of "England at the Polls '84" and branding it's "England Decides" mantra for every succeeding election. The election was regarded as a watershed moment for the young cable network and cable news in general, which was able to focus solely on the divisive election and provide coverage on breaking developments and expert analysis, while the established broadcast networks ETV, ETV2 and ERTC were required to fulfill their contractually scheduled broadcats beyond intermittent daily news coverage.