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1985 in the United Kingdom:

Other years

1983 | 1984 | 1985 | 1986 | 1987

Sport and Music

British and Irish current events

1985 English cricket season

Football England | Scotland

1985 in British music

Events from the year 1985 in the United Kingdom.

Incumbents

• Monarch - HM Queen Elizabeth II
• Prime Minister - Margaret Thatcher, Conservative

Events

• 1 January - The first British mobile phone call is made (by Ernie Wise to Vodafone).^[1]
• 10 January
  • launch of Sinclair C5, which was designed by the British inventor Clive Sinclair.^[2][3]
  • Eight people are killed by a gas explosion in Putney.^[4]
• 17 January - British Telecom announces it is going to phase out its famous red telephone boxes.
• 23 January - A debate in the House of Lords is televised for the first time.^[2]
• 29 January - Margaret Thatcher became the first post-war Prime Minister to be refused an honorary degree by Oxford University.^[5]
• 16 February - Clive Ponting resigns from the Ministry of Defence after his acquittal of breaching the Official Secrets Act concerning the leaking of documents relating to the sinking of the ARA General Belgrano during the Falklands War.^[6]
• 19 February - EastEnders, the BBC1 soap opera, goes on air.^[2]
• March - Ford introduces the third generation of its top-of-the-range Granada, which is the world's first high volume production car to feature anti-lock brakes as standard throughout the range. All versions will be built at Cologne in West Germany.
• 3 March - The miners' strike ends after one year.^[7]
• 11 March - Mohammed Al Fayed buys the London-based department store company Harrods.
• 13 March - Rioting breaks out at the FA Cup quarter-final between Luton Town and Millwall at Kenilworth Road, Luton; hundreds of hooligans tear seats from the stands and throw them onto the pitch before a pitch invasion takes place, resulting in 81 people (31 of them police officers) being injured. The carnage continued in the streets near the stadium, resulting in major damage to vehicles and property. Luton Town won the game 1-0.
• 22 April - Construction of Japanese carmaker Nissan's new factory at Sunderland begins. The first cars are expected to be produced next year. [1]
• 11 May - A fire engulfs a wooden stand at the Valley Parade stadium in Bradford during a football match, killing 56 people (54 Bradford City supporters and two Lincoln City supporters) and injuring more than 200 others.^[8]
• 16 May
  • Two South Wales miners are sentenced to life imprisonment for the murder of taxi driver David Wilkie. Dean Hancock and Russell Shankland, both 21, dropped a concrete block on Mr Wilkie's taxi from a road overbridge in November last year.
  • Scientists of the British Antarctic Survey discover the ozone hole.^[2]
• 18 May - Manchester United win the FA Cup for the sixth time in their history with a 1-0 win over Everton in the final at Wembley Stadium.
• 29 May - In the Heysel Stadium disaster at the European Cup final in Brussels, 39 football fans die and hundreds are injured. Despite the tragedy, the match is played and Juventus beat Liverpool 1-0.
• 1 June - Battle of the Beanfield, Britain's largest mass arrest and the effective end of Stonehenge Free Festivals.^[9][10]
• 2 June - In response to the Heysel tragedy three days ago, UEFA bans all English football clubs from European competitions for an indefinite period, recommending that Liverpool should serve an extra three years of exclusion once all other English clubs have been reinstated. [2]
• 25 June - Police arrest 13 suspects in connection with the Brighton hotel bombing of 1984.^[11]
• 4 July - 13-year-old Ruth Lawrence achieves a first in Mathematics at Oxford University, by becoming the youngest British person ever to earn a first-class degree and the youngest known graduate of Oxford University.^[12]
• 13 July - Live Aid pop concerts in Philadelphia and London raise over £50 million for famine relief in Ethiopia.^[13]
• 13 August
  • First ever heart-lung transplant carried out at the Harefield Hospital in Middlesex. The patient is three-year-old Jamie Gavin.^[14]
  • The Sinclair C5 ceases production after just seven months and less than 17,000 units.
• 22 August - 55 people killed in the Manchester air disaster at Manchester International Airport when a British Airtours Boeing 737 burst into flames after the pilot aborts the takeoff.
• 1 September - A joint American-French expedition locates the wreck of the RMS Titanic.
• 4 September - The first photographs and films of the RMS Titanic's wreckage are taken, 73 years after it sank.

[3]

• 9 September - Rioting, mostly motivated by racial tension, breaks out in the Handsworth area of Birmingham. [4]
• 10 September -
  • - The riots in Handsworth have escalated, with mass arson and looting which has resulted in thousands of pounds worth of damage, left several people injured and resulted in the death of two people who died when the local post office was petrol bombed. One of the fatalities was the owner of the post office.^[15]
    • - Scotland national football team manager Jock Stein, 62, collapses and dies from a heart attack at the end of his team's 1-1 draw with Wales at Ninian Park, Cardiff, which secured Scotland's place in the World Cup qualification playoff. [5]
• 11 September - The rioting in Handsworth ends, with the final casualty toll standing at 35 injuries and two deaths.
• 17 September - Mrs Thatcher's hopes of winning a third term in office at the next election are thrown into doubt by the results of an opinion poll, which shows the Tories in third place on 30%, Labour in second place on 33% and the SDP/Liberal Alliance in the lead on 35%. [6]
• 28 September - A riot in Brixton erupts after an accidental shooting of a woman by police.^[16]
• 1 October - Riots in Toxteth and Peckham; Lord Scarman's report blamed the riots on economic deprivation and racial discrimination.^[17]
• 6 October - PC Keith Blakelock is killed during the Broadwater Farm Riot in Tottenham, London.^[18]
• 28 October - Production of the Peugeot 309 begins at the Ryton car factory near Coventry. The 309, a small family hatchback, is the first "foreign" car to be built in the UK. It was originally going to be badged as the Talbot Arizona, but Peugeot has decided that the Talbot badge will be discontinued on passenger cars after next year and that the Ryton plant will then be used for the production of its own products, including a larger four-door saloon (similar in size to the Ford Sierra) which is due in two years.
• 9 November - Prince Charles and Princess Diana arrive in the United States of America for a visit to Ronald Reagan in Washington DC. [7]
• 15 November - Anglo-Irish Agreement signed at Hillsborough Castle. Treasury Minister Ian Gow resigns in protest at the deal.^[19]
• 19 November - The latest MORI poll shows that Tory and Labour support is almost equal at around 36%, with the SDP/Liberal Allliance's hopes of electoral breakthrough are left looking bleak as they can only chalk up 25% of the vote. [8]
• 27 November - Labour Party leader Neil Kinnock suspends the Liverpool District Labour Party amid allegations that the revolutionary socialist group Militant Tendency was operating behind it. [9]
• 28 November - Gerard Hoarau, exiled political leader from the Seychelles, assassinated in London.
• 29 November - a gas explosion kills four people in Glasgow.^[20]
• December - Builders Alfred McAlpine complete the construction of Nissan's new car factory at Sunderland. Nissan can now install machinery and factory components, and are expected to produce the factory's first cars over the next few months.
• 26 December - Rock star Phil Lynott, formerly of Thin Lizzy, is rushed to hospital after collapsing from a suspected heroin overdose at his home in Berkshire.

Undated

• Inflation stands at 6.1% - the highest since 1982 but still low compared to the highs reached in the 1970s. [10]

Publications

• Iain Banks' novel Walking on Glass.
• Jeanette Winterson's novel Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit.

Births

• January 1 — Steven Davis, footballer
• January 7 — Lewis Hamilton, Formula One racing driver
• February 1 — Dean Shiels, footballer
• February 10 — Cath Rae, Scottish field hockey goalkeeper
• March 3 — Sam Morrow, footballer
• March 26 — Keira Knightley, actress
• April 8 — Gareth Rees, cricketer
• May 2 — Lily Allen, singer
• May 21 — Alex Danson, English field hockey forward
• May 28 — Carey Mulligan, actress
• June 28 — Phil Bardsley, footballer
• October 24 — Wayne Rooney, footballer
• November 8 — Jack Osbourne, actor
• December 23 — Harry Judd, drummer

Deaths

• 4 January - Sir Brian Horrocks, general (born 1895)
• 26 January - David Ormsby-Gore, 5th Baron Harlech, politician (born 1918)
• 6 February - James Hadley Chase, writer (born 1906)
• 28 February - Ray Ellington, singer, drummer and bandleader (born 1916)
• 21 March - Michael Redgrave, actor (born 1908)
• 4 April - Kate Roberts, author (born 1891)
• 5 May - Donald Bailey, civil engineer (born 1901)
• 9 June - Clifford Evans, actor (born 1912)
• 17 June - John Boulting, film director (born 1913)
• 2 July - David Purley, race car driver (born 1945)
• 8 July - Frank Hampson, illustrator (born 1918)
• 9 July - Jimmy Kinnon, founder of Narcotics Anonymous (born 1911)
• 23 July - Johnny Wardle, cricketer (born 1923)
• 1 September - Saunders Lewis, writer and founder of the Welsh National Party (Plaid Cymru)(born 1893)
• 7 September - Rodney Robert Porter, biochemist, recipient of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine (born 1917)
• 10 September - Jock Stein, footballer and manager of Scotland (born 1922)
• 11 September - William Alwyn, composer (born 1905)
• 17 September - Laura Ashley, designer (born 1925)
• 2 December - Philip Larkin, poet (born 1922)
• 7 December - Robert Graves, writer (born 1895)
• 12 December - Ian Stewart, rock musician (born 1938)

References

See also