As has been noted before on this site, the Tories are “uncoalitionable”. [uncoalitionable] A swing against the party at the next election and loss of seats could leave the Conservative Party still with most seats in a Hung Parliament and yet unable to form a government due to a lack of potential allies. Chesham & Amersham shows the Tories could be vulnerable to the Lib Dems in some seats in the South and a swing towards Labour could see the…
It is clear levelling up is dead. HS2 dominated the news this week but arguably a more important story happened this week, one that arguably might cost the Tories a majority at the next election and answer that question, how could Labour win a majority at the next election? For those of us who recall the 2017 general election Mrs May was on course to win 470 seats, a majority of 290 until she announced her social care plans, then…
Many people, myself included, think based on the current polling and historical precedents, the government are on course to win a majority at the the next general election. Yet there’s a nagging feeling that there could be a black swan or just a regular swan that might upend those assumptions about the next general election. Looking at those findings from YouGov atop this thread, there’s potential for a cost of living crisis damaging the government. It is possible that any…
Sir Keir Starmer might be a symptom not a cause of a long term Labour malaise. Sir Keir Starmer attracts a lot of criticism for his failure to perform better against Boris Johnson, looking at the polling figures (both voting intention and leadership metrics) it appears at the next general election Sir Keir is set play the role of Khalid bin Barghash to Boris Johnson’s Harry Rawson. I have a bit of sympathy for Starmer, one because of the toxic…
I find this polling very striking both in the abstract and the trend with just 7% of Leavers thinking Brexiters is going very well. When we were members of the EU the media and others blamed plenty of the country’s ills on our membership of the Nobel peace prize winning organisation, now that we have left the EU Brexiteers will have get use to the inverse of that, most of the country’s ills will be blamed on Brexit. I would…
I’ve generally avoided the market on when Sir Keir Starmer will cease to be Labour leader because the year of the next general election is uncertain thanks to planned repeal of the Fixed-term Parliaments Act and talk of Boris Johnson planning to call a 2023 election. This market from Ladbrokes is much more easier for me, will Starmer be Labour Leader at the next election and my inclination is to back Yes. Given how hard it is force out a…
It is often said that Labour has no route to Downing Street without retrieving its former solid bloc of seats north of the border. Or winning back those “Red Wall” seats in the north-west and north-east of England. What is less often remarked upon is that it will not be enough – unless it can also do something about the Midlands. The part of the country which was until recently packed with marginals is fast moving them into safe Conservative…
There’s a lot of water to flow under the bridge before the next general election. The future of Scotland and potential boundary changes are just two issues that would change the dynamics. Nevertheless, this piece assesses the potential for opposition parties and their voters working together to deny the Conservatives a majority at the next election. The data behind the analysis can be found here. Tactical voting is an established part of our first past the post electoral system. For the most part it is done by those…