
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: MONDAY, June 4, 1990                   TAG: 9006040037
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL                    PAGE: A2   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: LONDON                                LENGTH: Short

SOCIAL DEMOCRATS VOTE TO DISBAND PARTY IN BRITAIN

Leaders of the centrist Social Democratic Party voted to disband Sunday because of waning electoral fortunes, only nine years after it was founded in a dramatic challenge to Britain's established political order.

"If we did nothing else, we showed the importance of standing by your principles and policies which you think are in the best interest of the country," said leader David Owen after the national committee reached its decision.

Owen helped form the party in 1981 to offer voters a centrist alternative to the Conservative Party and then-increasingly leftist Labor Party. But party membership had dwindled to only 6,000 members and in a parliamentary election last month was even beaten by a spoof party.

by CNB