Premiership of the Duke of Warwick
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| Premiership of the Duke of Warwick 2 August 2024 – 27 August 2024 | |
| Monarch | Charles III |
|---|---|
| Cabinet | Warwick Ministry Warwick Caretaker Ministry |
| Party | The Unionist Party |
| Seat | 10 Downing Street |
 Coat of Arms of HM Government under Charles III | |
James Forsyte, The Duke of Warwick's term as Prime Minister of Great Britain began on 2 August 2024 when he accepted the invitation of Charles III to form a Government, following the resignation of Josephine Carew-Grey, The Baroness Wilton, and concluded on the 27 August 2024 following his resignation and the contested results of the August 2024 General Election. He also served as First Lord of the Treasury and as Leader of the Unionist Party during this time. He is the fourth Prime Minister of Charles III. He is the first Prime Minister since 2022 to be appointed following the resignation of a predecessor. He is the third Unionist Prime Minister. He led a coalition of the Unionist Party and the British Workers' Party to secure a majority in the 33rd Parliament of Great Britain, though a flurry of parliamentary resignations across the term meant that the Unionists themselves formed a working majority by the conclusion of the Session.
A former Prime Minister who holds the record for longest single tenure in office for any elected Prime Minister in the modern democratic system (133 days across two consecutive terms as a Liberal Democrat PM), Forsyte initially retired from public life in January 2024, following the fallout from the Duke of Warwick Affair that led to the collapse of the Liberal Democrats as both HM Most Loyal Opposition and as a party. However, Forsyte would return more broadly to the region and began carving out a place for himself; he was the longest-serving Chancellor of the Exchequer during the Premiership of the Baron Knightstone, having accepted the role following the collapse of the Concorde Coalition. Later, he served as an Independent MP during the 32nd Session of Parliament, in a formal confidence-and-supply agreement with the Unionist Party: he would ultimately join as a full member of the Unionists for the following session. Promoted to Deputy Prime Minister but no longer Chancellor during the Premiership of the Baroness Wilton, Forsyte became the apparent second-in-command in Government. The Baroness Wilton announced her intention to resign as Party Leader and as Prime Minister at the Unionist Party Conference in Brighton, to which Forsyte was the frontrunner in the controversial leadership elections, where he defeated the late Owain Carew-Grey, Lord Knightstone. As a result, he was invited to form a Government, the first PM to take up the mantle midterm since Charles Wright, The Baron Huntingdon who did so in July 2022 (interestingly, Lord Huntingdon succeeded Forsyte, who resigned due to medical reasons).
Immediately, Forsyte saw success, most pre-eminently in Foreign Affairs. He saw through the signing of both the Treaty of Sentinel with Sky Haven and the Treaty of Ilion with Sophia, doing so despite Parliamentary fallout and the resignation of his Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, Owain Carew-Grey, over unrelated issues. Forsyte oversaw the steady enactment of his predecessors ambitious, but at times criticised, "79-point platform", including sweeping domestic and legislative changes such as the building blocks for Frontier Status, a change in residency and citizenship laws, and the return of Estates, a key part of his coalition-partners manifesto.
The term was not withouts it controversy: the Estate Development Act was notable for its spurring of passionate debate in both chambers of the Palace of Westminster, while continued spats between Warwick's predecessor and the Leader of the Opposition ultimately were precursors to their departures from the region. However, neither of these developments could be overly attributed to the Prime Minister. A reduction in citizenship and nation count was percieved to be the biggest failure of the term. Ultimately, much of the vitriol surrounding his term from a resurgent Heron Party was formed more broadly because the results of the Unionist Leadership Election and the controversy surrounding that, as opposed to Forsyte's personal standing.
The Premiership ended following the conclusion of the August 2024 General Election, where a hung Parliament and a series of bitter, divisive negotiations between the Heron Party and the Unionist-Workers Coalition resulted in a stalemate, seeing both Party Leaders - including Warwick - propose compromise candidates that, folllowing the support of an Independent Candidate in Warwick's former protege James Spencer, saw the return of Thomas Carew to 10 Downing Street, closing the Premiership of the Duke of Warwick after 26 days. While the tenure as a whole is not looked upon with undiluted pleasure, it remains a significant part of political history: Forsyte would never hold high office again, retiring from politics at the end of 2024 to take on the position of an Election Commissioner. However, his legacy as one of the region's most prolific and successful politicians remains intact.