B00DPX9ST8 EBOK (120 page)

This version, then, is consistent with what we’re told in the series and with what someone writing in the early seventies would extrapolate as a plausible backdrop for a science-fantasy adventure show set in the near future.

Some recent writers - particularly those who see the UNIT stories as being set at the time of broadcast - have developed a parallel political history for
early
1970s Britain of the
Doctor Who
universe. Books like
Who Killed Kennedy
and
The Devil Goblins from Neptune
infer that events in the UNIT stories destabilised actual governments. This seems to be the logical consequence of the catalogue of incompetent government action, politicians dying, international crises and high profile disasters we see ... although in the TV series, politicians and civil servants are depicted, almost to a man, as complacent and obtuse. They seem far
too
secure, rather than people scared the government will fall at any moment.

All in all, the various things we are told about the parallel political history described in the books are difficult to reconcile.

In real life, the Prime Ministers since 1970 (along with the date of the general election, the winning party and their majority) were:

Heath (18th June, 1970, Conservative, 30)

Wilson (28th February, 1974, Labour minority, 0)

Wilson (10th October, 1974, Labour, 4)

Callaghan (5th April, 1976)

Thatcher (3rd May, 1979, Conservative, 43)

Thatcher (9th June, 1983, Conservative, 143)

Thatcher (11th June, 1987, Conservative, 102)

Major (27th November, 1991)

Major (9th April, 1992, Conservative, 21)

Blair (1st May, 1997, Labour, 179)

Blair (7th June, 2001, Labour, 167)

Blair (5th May, 2005, Labour, 66)

Cameron (6th May, 2010, Conservative coalition, 0)

In the books, a Liberal-led coalition government was formed in January 1970.
The
Devil Goblins from Neptune
(p8) states, “an alliance of Liberals, various disenfranchised Tories and Socialists, and a group of minor fringe parties, enter power on a platform of social reform, the abolition of the death penalty, and a strong interstellar defence programme”.

In June 1970, Heath defeats Wilson, just as in our history (
Who Killed Kennedy
). This can’t be easily reconciled with
The
Devil Goblins from Neptune
, which also takes place in June 1970.

Shirley Williams is Prime Minister in
No Future
, set just after
Terror of the Zygons
in 1976. We’re told that Thorpe had resigned mid-term, but there is also reference to Wilson.

In
Millennial Rites,
a female PM lost an election in the early eighties. In 1999, the leader of the Opposition is a woman (“all handbag and perm”). The Prime Minister is a man.

The unnamed winner of the 1997 general election was assassinated in
The Dying Days
. Edward Greyhaven is installed Prime Minister by the new Martian King of England, but dies during the course of the story.

Terry Brooks, Prime Minister in 1999, tries to fake a military coup as a pretext to dismantle the military and spend the money health and education instead. He is forced to resign, and is replaced by Philip Cotton. (
Millennium Shock -
they’re a thinly-veiled Tony Blair and Jack Straw).

Tony Blair is alive, well and Prime Minister in
Project: Twilight
and
Death Comes to Time
. Mickey mentions him in
Rise of the Cybermen
.

Interference
lists the recent British Prime Ministers as Heath, Thorpe, Williams, Thatcher, Major, Blair and Clarke. (The last could be senior Conservative Kenneth Clarke, but could possibly be Labour’s Charles Clarke. The proofreader added the “e” - Lawrence Miles’ original intention was that it was Tory MP Alan Clark.)

Aliens of London
and
World War Three
had scenes set in Downing Street, with photographs of Callaghan and Major on the stairway (no photos of Thorpe, Williams, Brooks, Cotton or either Clarke were visible!). The Prime Minister of the day is murdered by the Slitheen, and Harriet Jones becomes PM sometime between this story and
The Christmas Invasion
.

Once we’re clear of the confused accounts of the 1970 elections, the sequence of Prime Ministers and when they come to power would seem to be:

Thorpe (Liberal coalition, in power at the time of
The Green Death
)

Williams (Labour, in power during
Terror of the Zygons
and
No Future
)

Thatcher (Conservative, who came to power in the early eighties, later than in real life)

Major (Conservative - we might infer he’s the assassinated winner of the 1997 election)

Greyhaven (briefly in 1997 and almost certainly not counted officially)

Brooks (Unknown party, possibly leading from 1997 to 1999)

Cotton (The same party as Brooks, takes over in 1999 - the leader of the opposition at this time is a woman, so isn’t... )

Blair (Labour, the dates are uncertain, but he comes to power later and apparently leaves earlier than in real life, and thus manages to avoid two successful alien assassinations of a British Prime Minister.)

Clarke (Unknown party, presumably the Prime Minister seen in the
UNIT
audio mini-series and assassinated in
Aliens of London
in 2006 - although the body looks more like Blair than either Kenneth or Charles Clarke, both of whom could comfortably accommodate a Slitheen in real life!)

Jones (The same party as Clarke. The ninth Doctor says in
World War Three
that she was originally supposed to serve three terms - possibly until c 2016 in
Trading Futures
, where the PM was male. However, her first term is curtailed by the tenth Doctor in
The Christmas Invasion
- this would seem to be a significant deviation of established history, unless the ninth Doctor was mistaken in
World War Three
to think Jones was a three-termer.)

Unknown. (There is at least one interim Prime Minister after Jones’ downfall in
The Christmas Invasion
. A blurry picture of him is seen in
TW: Out of Time
, along with the apparently sceptical headline, “Working Hard, Minister?”)

Saxon. (According to
The Sound of Drums
, he leads the newly-formed Saxon Party, which has attracted support from across the political spectrum. While time is reversed in
Last of the Time Lords
, his outing himself as the Master and ordering the death of the US President on global TV “still happens”. Saxon dies at the end of the story, which is set in 2008.)

Fairchild. (Killed in 2009 when the Daleks shoot his plane down in
The Stolen Earth
; he’s named as “Aubrey Fairchild” in
Beautiful Chaos
.)

Green. (Seen in
TW: Children of Earth
, set in September 2009 - he almost certainly takes over when when Fairchild dies earlier in the year. The story ends with Denise Riley, a member of Green’s cabinet, obtaining incriminating evidence on him, but it’s not said if she plans to force him out and become prime minister herself, or just pull his strings from behind the scenes. Either way, given the abominable events of
Children of Earth
- including the army being used to forcibly take thousands of children from their parents - it’s difficult to imagine the party in power winning the next election.
TW: The Men Who Sold the World
, set in 2010, alludes to the UK having a new coalition government.)

The Non-UNIT Seventies

NB: The line between a UNIT and non-UNIT story isn’t always clearly defined. When a reference makes a direct link to a UNIT era story, it is included in the UNIT Era section. When there’s a more vague or general reference to UNIT, it’s included here.

The Doctor once took piano lessons from a man called Elton.
 [353]
He also had to swim the English Channel naked, after losing a bet with Oliver Reed.
 [354]

Isaac Summerfield moved his team to London, where they were based in a centre for the homeless.
 [355]
The Doctor fought the Geomatide Macros on Sunset Boulevard in the 1970s, and defeated their plan to use ceiling tiles as a mathematical hyperspace vector generator.
 [356]

The archaeologist Bradley Stapleton died as an exhibit of his work was being prepared. The eleventh Doctor sent Amy Pond’s journal of Stapleton’s doomed 1929 expedition to the man’s granddaughter.
 [357]

NASA sent messages - including maps of the solar system and details about humanity - into space in the 70s. One alien race sent a reply, which wound up in the possession of Henry John Parker, a millionaire collector of alien artifacts.
 [358]

Jack Harkness had a moustache at some point in the 70s.
 [359]
He claimed that movies in the 1970s were so bad, making out was guaranteed. It wasn’t unknown for him to wear platforms and five-inch lapels.
 [360]

1970

In 1970, the book
Great Finds
described the Roman mosaic discovered in 1964.
 [361]
The United States officially cancelled the Apollo spaceflight programme, bowing to criticism of its expense, but continued it in secret - if for no other reason than every dollar spent on Apollo yielded $14 back from related exports, patents and expertise.
 [362]

Geoff and Sylvia Noble, the future parents of Donna Noble, were married.
 [363]
A ship containing a hundred Veil crashed on Earth and was taken to a hyperdimensional Vault by the Alliance of Shades.
 [364]

Sarah Jane Smith began doorstepping when she was 19.
 [365]
Lionel Carson served as Sarah Jane’s editor when she first started out with the national papers, but he later moved on to the food and wine circuit.
 [366]
Professor Edward Shepherd educated Sarah Jane on the ethics of journalism while she was at university, and was the best teacher she ever had.
 [367]
Sarah Jane specialised in English and humanities.
 [368]
She studied under James Stevens, as did Ruby Duvall.
 [369]

1970 (January) - Day of the Moon
 [370]

Six months after escaping the Silence, young Melody Pond - now wandering the streets of New York - regenerated in an alleyway.

Melody’s new body looked like a toddler. A quarter-century later, she would end up in Leadworth, meet her future parents (Amy and Rory) and become their best friend, Melody “Mels” Zucker.
 [371]

c 1970 (20th March) - The Underwater Menace
 [372]

The mad Professor Zaroff died in agony while attempting to raise Atlantis from the ocean floor with his Plunger.

On 5th April, 1970, Hitler’s remains were exhumed and destroyed on the orders of Andropov, head of the KGB.
 [373]
On 14th August, the Revolution Man cult claimed Ed Hill was the Messiah.
 [374]

The seventh Doctor’s companion Ace was born
Dorothy
Gale McShane on 20th August, 1970, to
Audrey
and Harry McShane.
 [375]
Around 1970, an Imperial bodyguard and nurse fled from the far future with Miranda, the daughter of the Emperor, following a revolution in which the Imperial Family were hunted down and killed. The fugitives settled in the Derbyshire village of Greyfrith.
 [376]