London — "A new dawn has broken, has it not?"
Those were the standout words Tony Blair delivered to adoring Labour Party supporters on the banks of the River Thames in the early hours of May 2, 1997 after his historic landslide victory in the general election the day before.
His Labour Party had trounced the Conservative Party, which had been in power for 18 years, securing its biggest-ever majority in the House of Commons of 179 seats.
A period of Labour hegemony surely loomed. And so it did.
Now, 20 years on from that historic day for Labour, the party, according to some opinion polls, may face its biggest defeat since World War II in the upcoming election on June 8.
Why the turnaround?
British national papers published the day after Prime Minister Tony Blair's Labour Party won its third straight election. File picture: Jane Mingay/AP
BLAIR'S LANDSLIDE
The high watermark of Labour's electoral fortunes was May 1, 1997 when Blair secured his first victory against a demoralized Conservative Party.
Having maneuvered his party to the center ground — he, along with President Bill Clinton, was an advocate of the so-called third way — Blair convinced parts of the country, even those in prosperous counties outside of London, to change a habit of a lifetime and vote Labour.
US President Bill Clinton, center right, and his wife Hillary, left, pose in front of London's Tower Bridge with British Prime Minister Tony Blair, right, and his wife Cherie, center left, before dining in a nearby restaurant on May 29, 1997. Four weeks earlier, Blair had led his Labour Party to an unprecedented victory in the General Election. File picture: Greg Gibson/AP
BUSH AND IRAQ
All went smoothly for Blair — at first. The British economy was in the midst of an unprecedented period of economic growth but Blair remained cautious.
Another convincing victory in 2001 — on a far lower turnout — offered Blair the chance to push through more ambitious domestic reforms.
But his agenda was overwhelmed by the Sept. 11 attacks in the U.S.
Blair became a close ally of Clinton's successor, President George W. Bush. His decision to participate in the war in Iraq alienated many, not least because no weapons of mass destruction were ever found. Blair's reputation — and arguably Labour's — has never fully recovered.
President George Bush welcomes British Prime Minister Tony Blair as he arrives for talks at Camp David, Maryland on September 7, 2002. File picture: J. Scott Applewhite/AP
ELECTORAL FEEDBACK
Iraq cast a huge shadow over the 2005 general election, which Labour won with a far-reduced majority on a much smaller share of the vote.
Between 1997 and 2005, Labour had lost around 4 million votes. Instead of 43 percent of total votes cast, Labour got barely more than 35 percent — still enough to deliver a working majority in Parliament because of the vagaries of the British electoral system.
The election clearly signaled a turning point. With allies of Gordon Brown, who was at the helm at the Treasury for a decade, agitating for Blair to stand aside, Labour's three-time election winner announced his intention to resign in the summer of 2007.
Protesters pack London's Whitehall during a march to Hyde Park, to demonstrate against a possible war against Iraq on February 15, 2003. The Iraq war is widely seen as damaging the reputation of then Prime Minister Tony Blair as well as his Labour Party. File picture: Alastair Grant/AP
CRASH AND CRISIS
Brown lost credibility after failing to call an early general election soon after replacing Blair as prime minister. His allies had let the speculation run and run. It was a "humiliating retreat," according to then-Conservative Party leader David Cameron.
Brown's time at the helm was marked by the global financial crisis. Following the collapse of much-bigger U.S. investment bank Lehman Brothers in September 2008, the financial crisis went global. Banks around the world, including some big U.K. names such as Lloyds and Royal Bank of Scotland, had to be bailed out by the taxpayer.
British Prime Minister Gordon Brown leaves 10 Downing Street for parliament on October 10, 2007. Brown's failure to call an early general election earlier that month damaged his reputation and widely considered to have contributed to the Labour Party's defeat at the 2010 General Election. File picture: Sang Tan/AP
The global economy went into a tailspin, and Britain endured its deepest recession since World War II.
Though Brown won some plaudits for his handling of the crisis, his ratings never recovered. A drained Labour Party was defeated in 2010, getting just 29 percent of the vote. However, the Conservatives didn't win an absolute majority, forcing Cameron to go into coalition with Nick Clegg's smaller Liberal Democrats.
Customers stand in a queue outside a branch of the Northern Rock bank in London on September 17, 2007. The run on the bank following a liquidity crisis damaged the reputation of the then Labour government and is considered to have been one reason why it lost power in 2010. File picture: Max Nash/AP
BROTHERLY FRICTION
Defeat meant a proper Labour Party leadership contest — unlike 2007's coronation of Brown.
One favorite was David Miliband, Brown's foreign secretary. However, his younger brother Ed pulled off a surprise victory with Labour's union base coming out strongly in support.
Ed Miliband failed to connect with the British public. Many think the wrong brother won and that David Miliband would have been better able to challenge Cameron.
Ed Miliband, left, the newly-elected leader of Britain's opposition Labour Party, shakes hands with his brother David Miliband, whom he defeated in a leadership contest following Labour's defeat at the General Election in May 2010. File picture: Lefteris Pitarakis/AP
SCOTLAND UPROOTED
At least, Ed Miliband could always rely on Scotland. Or so he thought.
With hindsight, the referendum for Scottish independence in September 2014 had dealt Labour a major blow.
Supporters of the Yes campaign in the Scottish independence referendum wave Scottish Saltire flags as they await the result after the polls closed, in Glasgow, Scotland on September 18, 2014. File picture: Matt Dunham/AP
Though Labour played an important role in the winning campaign against independence, the party's fortunes in Scotland took a dive as it had worked closely with the Conservatives — whose reputation in Scotland had soured under the leadership of Margaret Thatcher in the 1980s.
In the 2015 general election, Labour won just one seat in Scotland — against 41 five years earlier — as the pro-independence Scottish National Party swept to historic gains.
DOWN AGAIN
Opinion polls suggested that Cameron's Conservatives had little chance of winning the 2015 general election outright. They were wrong.
Though Labour's overall vote share at the 2015 election inched up to 30 percent, its haul of seats fell to its lowest level since 1983.
Britain's Prime Minister Tony Blair foreground mounts a bike, along with European leaders in the Dutch city of Amsterdam on June 17, 1997. One of Blair's ambitions after his Labour Party won a landslide election victory in May, 1997, was to put Britain at the "heart of Europe." File picture: Hermann Knippertz/AP
Cameron's majority meant he had to honor one aspect of his party's manifesto — a commitment to hold a referendum on Britain's 40-plus-year membership of the European Union. In June 2016, Britain surprisingly voted for Brexit, and Cameron was replaced by Theresa May. The result further damaged the legacy of Blair, who had wanted to put Britain "at the heart of Europe."
CORBYN'S CHALLENGE
After repeatedly saying she wouldn't call a snap general election, May changed her mind. One reason cited is that the polls show her winning strongly against a Labour Party led by someone most Labour lawmakers have tried to oust.
Britain's Labour Party leader Jeremy Corbyn waves on stage after he is announced as the new leader in London on September 12, 2015. File picture: Kirsty Wigglesworth/AP
Jeremy Corbyn is an unabashed man of the left, who only joined the post-2015 Labour leadership contest because some more moderate lawmakers thought the left should get a hearing.
Corbyn's challenge — a big one according to some polls which have the Conservatives 20 percentage points ahead of Labour — is to convince voters he's ready to be prime minister even though he's had trouble rallying so many of his own party behind his views and leadership style.