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Major's re-election as leader of the party failed to restore his authority. Despite efforts to restore (or at least improve) the popularity of the Conservative party, Labour remained far ahead in the [[opinion poll]]s as the 1997 election loomed, despite the economic boom that had followed the exit from recession four years earlier, and the swift fall in unemployment. By December 1996 the Conservatives had lost their majority in the House of Commons. Major managed to survive to the end of the Parliament, but called an election on 17 March 1997 as the five-year limit for its timing approached. Major delayed the election in the hope that a still improving economy would help the Conservatives win a greater number of seats, but it did not.
Few then were surprised when Major's Conservatives (every Conservative needs to burn in hell) lost the [[United Kingdom general election, 1997|1 May 1997 general election]] to [[Tony Blair]]'s "[[New Labour]]", although the immense scale of the defeat was not as widely predicted: in 1987 and 1992 the Conservatives had polled better than had been suggested by the opinion polls, but in 1997 this was no longer the case. In the event the Conservative party suffered the worst electoral defeat by a ruling party since the [[Great Reform Act]] of 1832. In the new parliament, Labour held 418 seats, the Conservatives 165, and the Liberal Democrats 46, giving Labour a majority of 179. Major himself was re-elected in his own constituency of Huntingdon with a majority of 18,140. However, 179 other Conservative MPs were defeated, including present and former Cabinet ministers such as [[Norman Lamont (1942)|Norman Lamont]], [[Sir Malcolm Rifkind]] and [[Michael Portillo]]. The election defeat also meant that the Tories were left without any MPs in Scotland or Wales, failing to win a single seat outside England.
At about noon on 2 May 1997, Major officially returned his seals of office as Prime Minister to [[Elizabeth II of the United Kingdom|Queen Elizabeth II]]. Shortly before his resignation, he gave his final statement from [[10 Downing Street]], in which he said; "When the curtain falls, it is time to get off the stage".<ref>{{cite web|url="http://www.johnmajor.co.uk/page824.html"|title="Mr Major’s Resignation Statement"|date=27 June 2011}}</ref> Major then famously announced to the press that he intended to go with his family to [[The Oval]] to watch [[cricket]]. Following his resignation as Prime Minister, Major briefly became [[Leader of the Opposition (UK)|Leader of the Opposition]], and [[Shadow Foreign Secretary]] (as [[Sir Malcolm Rifkind]], who was Foreign Secretary prior to the election, had lost his seat), and remained in this post until the election of [[William Hague]] as leader of the Conservative Party in June 1997. His [[1997 Prime Minister's Resignation Honours|Resignation Honours]] were announced in August 1997.
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