Britians Shadow Goverment Admission or ?

I was reading this online the other day from one of the this date in history sites



2) 1997 : Labour party returns to power in Britain

After 18 years of Conservative rule, British voters give the Labour Party, led by Tony Blair, a landslide victory in British parliamentary elections. In the poorest Conservative Party showing since 1832, Prime Minister John Major was rejected in favor of Scottish-born Blair, who at age 43 became the youngest British prime minister in more than a century.

Blair studied law at Oxford and joined the Labour Party in 1975. In 1983, he was elected to Parliament from Sedgefield and became the party's spokesperson on treasury affairs in 1985, and trade and industry in 1987. In the next year, he joined the shadow cabinet as energy secretary and in 1993 became shadow home secretary.?????????? In 1994, he was elected leader of the Labour Party, and during the next three years he orchestrated Labour's ideological shift to the middle, borrowing such popular Conservative policies as free-market reforms. In May 1997, his "new" Labour Party won a resounding victory, and he was sworn in as prime minister. With Blair at its helm, the Labour Party went on to win three consecutive general-election victories. Blair was re-elected in 2001 and 2005, despite his support for U.S. President George W. Bush and the war in Iraq, which was unpopular among many Brits. He has now served longer as prime minister than any other Labour Party member in history.

Shadow Home Secretary and Shadow Cabinet as Energy Secretary

Maybe somebody from the U.K. can answer?

is this shadow term used in Britians polotics or what?

where is the source from? it would help if you listed a website or news article instead of just a clipping...and I highly doubt they'd mean that. Mabye it means an intern who "shadows" a person doing the real job

Originally posted by steve22
where is the source from? it would help if you listed a website or news article instead of just a clipping...and I highly doubt they'd mean that. Mabye it means an intern who "shadows" a person doing the real job

www.history.com...

check May 1st

In the UK the term "shadow cabinet", "shadow home secretary", "shadow energy secretary" etc., just refers to the fact that they belong to the party in opposition.

When Blair became Leader of the Labour Party, before they were elected he would have been referred to as "The Leader of the Opposition" and he would have had a Shadow Cabinet himself.

Once they were elected however, the people in the Shadow Cabinet would assume the office of government i.e. the Shadow Home Secretary would become the actual Home Secretary, nothing spooky or underhand (or exciting) about it I'm afraid, just a strange English naming convention.

Explained better here:

en.wikipedia.org...

[edit on 6-5-2007 by Oski]

[edit on 6-5-2007 by Oski]

[edit on 6-5-2007 by Oski]

Thanks for the info,

In regards to WIKIPEDIA-- the biggest disinformation tool on the net. I really wish people would stop using this in jhopes of getting the truth.

sorry mods didnt mean to go off topic in me own thread.