Events from the year 1983 in the United Kingdom.
Incumbents Monarch – Elizabeth II Prime Minister – Margaret Thatcher (Conservative)
Events
January 1 January – The British Nationality Act 1981 comes into effect creating five classes of British nationality. 3 January – Children's ITV is launched as a new branding for the late afternoon programming block on the ITV network. 5 January – Two policemen and a policewoman drown at Blackpool after going into the sea to rescue a man who entered the sea to save his dog (both of whom also drown). 6 January – Danish fishermen defy the British government's prohibition on non-UK boats fishing in its coastal waters. 14 January – Shooting of Stephen Waldorf: Armed policemen shoot and severely injure an innocent car passenger in London, believing him to be escaped prisoner David Martin. 17 January – The first British breakfast television programme, Breakfast Time, is launched on BBC One at 6:30AM. 19 January – The two policemen who wounded Stephen Waldorf are charged with attempted murder and released on bail; they are suspended from duty pending further investigation. 23 January – The prohibition on non-British boats fishing in British waters is lifted as the European Economic Community's Common Fisheries Policy comes into effect. 25 January – The Infrared Astronomical Satellite, the first-ever space-based observatory to perform a survey of the entire sky at infrared wavelengths, is launched. The satellite is a joint project between the American space agency NASA, the Netherlands Agency for Aerospace Programmes and the UK's Science and Engineering Research Council. 26 January – Red rain falls in the UK, caused by sand from the Sahara Desert in the droplets. 28 January – Escaped prisoner David Martin (for whom Stephen Waldorf was mistaken) is rearrested. 31 January – Seatbelt use for drivers and front seat passengers becomes mandatory, 11 years after becoming compulsory equipment in new cars.
February February – Work begins on extending the Piccadilly line of London Underground at Heathrow Airport to serve the new Terminal 4. 1 February – TV-am launches on ITV. 3 February – Unemployment stands at a record high of 3,224,715 – though the previous high reached in the Great Depression of the early 1930s accounted for a higher percentage of the workforce. 10 February – Dismembered sets of human remains are found at a block of flats in Muswell Hill, North London. 37-year-old civil servant Dennis Nilsen is arrested on suspicion of murder. 11 February – Dennis Nilsen is charged with the murder of 20-year-old Stephen Sinclair, who was last seen alive in January. Police are working to identify the other sets of human remains found at Nilsen's flat, in order to press further murder charges against Nilsen; his trial will open in October. 14 February – Roger Hargreaves' Little Miss TV series is first broadcast on BBC1. 15 February – The Austin Metro is now Britain's best selling car, having outsold every other new car registered in the UK during January. 24 February – Bermondsey by-election: Simon Hughes (Liberal) defeats Peter Tatchell (Labour) with the largest by-election swing in British political history (44.2%) following a campaign characterised by homophobia. The Official Monster Raving Loony Party first contests an election under this label. 26 February – Pat Jennings, 37-year-old Arsenal and Northern Ireland goalkeeper, becomes the first player in the English game to appear in 1,000 senior football matches.
March March – The compact disc (CD) goes on sale in the United Kingdom. 1 March – British Leyland launches the Austin Maestro, a five-door family hatchback with front-wheel drive which replaces the recently discontinued Maxi and Allegro. The Maestro also forms the basis of a new range of saloons and estates which are set to go into production early next year. 8 March – The notable composer Sir William Walton dies aged 80 at La Mortella, his home on the Italian island of Ischia. 15 March – The Budget raises tax allowances, and cuts taxes by £2 billion. 24 March – The Darlington by-election caused by the death of sitting Labour MP Edward Fletcher on 13 February is held; Oswald O'Brien holds the seat for Labour. 26 March – Liverpool win the Football League Cup for the third year in succession, beating Manchester United 2–1 in the final at Wembley Stadium. The Reds, whose manager Bob Paisley will retire at the end of the current football season, are also on course to win the Football League First Division title for a record 14th time. 28 March – Ian MacGregor appointed as chairman of the National Coal Board, taking office on 1 September.
April April – Vauxhall launches the Nova supermini with a range of three-door hatchbacks and two-door saloons. It is the first Vauxhall to be built outside the United Kingdom, being assembled at the Zaragoza plant in Spain where it was launched seven months ago as the Opel Corsa, but plans to launch it on the British market had been attacked by trade unions who were angry at the fact that it would not be built in Britain. Its launch is expected to result in the end of Vauxhall Chevette production in Britain. 1 April Thousands of protesters form a 14-mile human chain in reaction to the siting of American nuclear weapons in British military bases. The government expels three Russians named as KGB agents by a Soviet defector. 4 April – The biggest cash haul in British history sees gunmen escape with £7 million from a Security Express van in East London. 11 April – Richard Attenborough's 1982 film Gandhi wins eight Academy Awards. 21 April – The one pound coin introduced in England and Wales.
May 9 May – Margaret Thatcher calls a general election for 9 June. Opinion polls show her on course for victory with the Tories 8–12 points ahead of Labour, and they are widely expected to form a significant overall majority due to the split in left-wing votes caused by the Alliance, who are now aiming to take Labour's place in opposition. 11 May - Aberdeen F.C. beat Real Madrid 2–1 (after extra time) to win the European Cup Winner's Cup. They are currently (as of 2023) the last team to beat Real Madrid in a European Final. 14 May – Dundee United F.C. are crowned Scottish football champions for the first time in their history by winning the Scottish Premier Division, on the final day of the league season at the home of their city rivals Dundee F.C., Dens Park. 16 May – Wheel clamps are first used to combat illegal parking in London. 21 May – Manchester United and Brighton & Hove Albion draw 2–2 in the FA Cup final at Wembley Stadium. The replay will be held in five days time. 26 May Manchester United defeat Brighton & Hove Albion 4–0 in the FA Cup final replay at Wembley Stadium. Bryan Robson scores two of the goals, with the other two coming from Arnold Muhren and 18-year-old Norman Whiteside. Opinion polls suggest that the Conservatives are looking set to be re-elected with a landslide. A MORI poll puts them on 51%, 22 points ahead of Labour.
June 1 June Jockey Lester Piggott rides Teenoso to victory at the Epsom Derby, Piggott's ninth win in the race. Showjumper Caroline Bradley collapses from a heart attack after completing the first round of the Suffolk show, and dies later, aged 37. 6 June – The thirteenth James Bond film – Octopussy – is released in UK cinemas. It is the sixth of seven films to star Roger Moore as James Bond. 9 June – 1983 UK general election: Margaret Thatcher, Conservative Prime Minister of the United Kingdom since 1979, wins a landslide victory with a majority of 144 seats (through just 42% of the popular vote) over Michael Foot, who led a highly divided and weakened Labour Party which earned only 28% of the vote. Among the new members of parliament are three Labour MP's who will be future party leaders, Tony Blair for Sedgefield in County Durham, Gordon Brown for Dunfermline East in Scotland and Jeremy Corbyn for Islington North in London. The election is also a disappointment for the SDP–Liberal Alliance, who come close behind Labour in votes but are left with a mere 23 MPs in the new parliament compared to Labour's 209. The new 650-seat parliament will have 397 Conservative MP's, whereas Labour now has just 209. The election also sees the retirement of former prime minister Harold Wilson after 38 years as a Labour MP. 10 June – Computer tycoon Clive Sinclair is knighted. 12 June – Michael Foot resigns as leader of the Labour Party. Neil Kinnock, shadow spokesman for education and MP for Islwyn in South Wales, is tipped to succeed him; however, the successor will not be confirmed until this autumn. 14 June – Roy Jenkins resigns as leader of the Social Democratic Party and is succeeded by David Owen. Although the SDP gained 25% (around 7 million) of the votes and fell just short of Labour in terms of votes, they attained only a fraction of the number of seats won by Labour. 15 June – The first episode of the historical sitcom Blackadder, is broadcast on BBC One. 16 June – National Museum of Photography, Film and Television opens in Bradford.
July 7 July – New chancellor Nigel Lawson announces public spending cuts of £500 million. 13 July Neil Kinnock escapes uninjured when his Ford Sierra overturns on the M4 motorway in Berkshire. MP's vote 361–245 against the reinstatement of the death penalty, 18 years after its abolition. 15 July – Much of the country embraces a heatwave as temperatures reach 33 °C in London. 16 July – Twenty people are killed in the 1983 British Airways Sikorsky S-61 crash in the Celtic Sea. 19 July – A large new model of a flesh-eating dinosaur is erected at the Natural History Museum. 21 July – Former prime minister Harold Wilson is one of 17 life peerages announced today, having stood down from parliament last month after 38 years as MP for Huyton, near Liverpool. 22 July – Production of the Ford Orion four-door saloon begins. The Orion is the saloon version of the Escort, but is also aimed at buyers of larger family saloon cars like the recently discontinued Cortina. It goes on sale this Autumn and is produced at the Halewood plant in Liverpool as well as the Valencia plant in Spain which also produces the smaller Fiesta. 26 July – A Catholic mother of ten, Victoria Gillick, loses a case in the High Court of Justice against the DHSS. Her application sought to prevent the distribution of contraceptives to children under the age of 16 without parental consent. The case goes to the House of Lords in 1985 when it is decided that it is legal for doctors to prescribe contraceptives to under-16s without parental consent in exceptional circumstances ("Gillick competence"). 28 July – The Penrith and the Border by-election, caused by the elevation of Conservative MP William Whitelaw to the peerage, is held; David Maclean holds the seat for the Conservatives. 29 July – Actor and novelist David Niven dies aged 73 at his home in Château d'Œx, Switzerland. 1 to 31 July – The two hundredth anniversary of the previous hottest month in the CET series sees a new record for heat with a monthly mean CET of – hotter than July 1783.
August 1 August – The new A-prefix car registration plates are launched, helping spur on the recovery in car sales following the slump at the start of the decade caused by the recession. 5 August – 22 Provisional Irish Republican Army (IRA) members receive sentences totalling over 4,000 years from a Belfast Court. 18 August – Architectural historian Sir Nikolaus Pevsner dies aged 81 at his home in Hampstead, London. 19 August – Temperatures reach 30 °C in London, as hot weather embraces the United Kingdom. 29 August – ITV launches Blockbusters, a gameshow hosted by Bob Holness and featuring sixth formers as its contestants.
September