Maastricht Rebels

The Maastricht Rebels were British members of Parliament (MPs) belonging to the then governing Conservative Party who refused to support the government of Prime Minister John Major in a series of votes in the House of Commons on the issue of the implementation of the Maastricht Treaty (Treaty on European Union) in British law.

The Maastricht Rebellion was a major event of John Major's troubled second term as Prime Minister (1992–1997). Major's party had a small majority, thus giving the relatively small number of rebels disproportionate influence: for example, there were 22 rebels on the second reading of the European Communities (Amendment) Bill in May 1992, and the government's majority at the time was only 21.

The rebellion had the support of former Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher and former Party Chairman Norman Tebbit.

Significant events in the rebellion

At the height of the rebellion, the 1993 Christchurch by-election was held, where a Conservative majority of 23,000 was turned into a Liberal Democrat majority of 16,000. Conservative showings in opinion polls were as low as 23%. John Major threatened the rebels with a general election (despite one only being held a year earlier).

The Labour Party brought in MPs who had just had surgery and others who had suffered heart attacks - a stretcher vote - to vote in the House of Commons, in an effort to bring the government down. The loyalists and rebels in the Conservative Party also brought in their own stretcher vote; for example, Bill Cash organised for one MP (Bill Walker), who was seriously ill, to fly from Scotland secretly, then hid him at the rebels' headquarters in Great College Street, before, with Labour connivance, hiding him in the family room of the Commons so that the Conservative whips would not know; the government consequently lost a vote.

At Third Reading, on 20 May 1993, the Labour whip was to abstain.