Good morning. Labour has won the general election. At Buckingham Palace later this morning, the King will ask Keir Starmer to form a government. He has taken Labour from defeat to power in four and a half short years, the first Labour leader to do so since Tony Blair in 1997. Scotland is Labour’s once again, with the SNP pummelled into its worst result since 2010. Meanwhile, the Liberal Democrats grabbed a stomping 71 MPs.
British politics has been recast. Anger at the Conservative government for the past five years has been demonstrated in ballot boxes across the country. The Tories have been ruthlessly punished for the mini-Budget, partygate and woeful government. They suffered their worst defeat ever, holding on to a projected 131 seats. Eleven cabinet ministers have been ejected from the House of Commons. Liz Truss lost her seat, as did Penny Mordaunt, Grant Shapps and the Transport Secretary Mark Harper. The party will go into a period of mourning and recrimination before setting off in a new direction.
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Labour’s victory is muted and precarious. Its vote share could have only gone up by one or two percentage points on 2019. Starmer could be about to win a majority nearly as large as New Labour’s in 1997 on a vote share of only 35 per cent, way below the 40 per cent Jeremy Corbyn won in 2017.
There were tremors across the country. Jonathan Ashworth, a Starmerite stalwart who was expected to get a big job in the new government, lost his seat in Leicester South to a pro-Palestinian candidate. This remarkable result shows how damaging Starmer’s response to the Gaza war has been. But it’s not just Gaza. Corbyn, who Starmer kicked out of the party, won as an independent candidate in Islington North. The Greens unseated the shadow culture secretary Thangam Debbonaire in Bristol Central. Large pockets of young and left-wing voters are rejecting Starmer for more radical alternatives.
He is also facing an insurgency on the right. This election is as much a story about who came in second place as it is about who came first. Reform mopped up votes, taking second place in 98 seats across the country. Take Leigh and Atherton. Labour’s Jo Platt won with 19,971 votes. But with 11,090 votes Reform jumped above the Conservatives on 6,483 votes. Turnout was down by 6.4 percentage points. A Labour victory – but one in which the Conservatives were routed by Reform and few people turned out to vote. That sums up the night. This Labour government was elected by a disaffected, unenthusiastic, angry public that has sought alternatives on the left and the right.
“We are coming for Labour,” Farage said in his victory speech in Clacton. Reform’s success will force immigration on to the political agenda of the coming parliament. There will be no respite in the criticism. Farage will try to drag politics to the right and usurp the Conservatives as the true opposition.
Labour’s response must be quiet, solid delivery. The party’s promise for this campaign was “change”. Many people voted for Labour merely to force a change of government. That has now been achieved. Labour will need to offer something more substantial if it wants to hold on to this victory.
Freddie’s picks
What does a Labour victory mean? How will the country change? George writes on the new government.
The former cabinet minister David Gauke reflects on where the Conservatives go from here.
And for something else: Lawrence Freedman writes about Israel’s two-front war.
Ben’s take
A Labour landslide. A victory written by the forecasters for the best part of a year and a bit. And yet, though the overall numbers point to Labour in excess of 400, and the Conservatives perilously close to 100, the seat-by-seat shifts tell many stories, and taste… bittersweet?
In the Tory-Labour fights, in the marginals that mattered, Labour did what it set out to do. There are few traditional battlegrounds where Labour fell short of upending the opposition. Of those that did, the Tories fell far – further than forecast, and Reform rose by more than expected. There was a realignment of sorts, but nothing like Canada in 1993. Nigel Farage’s own appeal among the (now former) Conservative base was not absolute. But it wasn’t nothing. And so Farage stands in splendour, eighth time lucky, an elected MP, with sidekicks on the east coast and East Midlands.
Labour cleaned up in Scotland, better than projected. Wales is now Tory-free. The north Kent coast has a litter of red, as does Oxfordshire, the south-west, the south-east – all England has given Labour a boon in seats. And with it, a landslide.
But there are losses to consider. Leicester is split between three parties. Blackburn has fallen. Jess Phillips and Wes Streeting won in the most marginal of constituency fights. The backlash against Labour over its intransigence on Israel-Palestine has cost it dear support, disproportionately in wards and seats with higher Muslim populations. The May local elections suggested it. But high-turnout elections on the 4 July have confirmed it. No one can be taken for granted.
And with that…
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All best,
Freddie — @freddiejh8
With a percentage of the vote barely more than Corbyn received in 2019 this Labour government is definitely one that it is on probation. If,as Starmer has said, it wants to be in power for a decade then it is going to have to be very bold. ''Steady as she goes'' will not cut it.
For those who would prefer PR to the present system ''because it would mostly produce a 'progressive' coalition'' it should be noted that the ''progressive'' parties share of the vote this time is about 53% . This would mean at the best, a rather precarious and unstable government.
Faridge is but a one trick pony, much like the Patel-Bravermans. On immigration, please consider medium or long term: better for immigrants and for the UK to control the issue; we clearly cannot invite the whole third world into the UK on equal rights. I agree with Branko Milanovitch that controlled immigration is needed, so that vetted immigrants can have rights increasing as they pay progressively more taxes and, with a share of those taxes going to local councils with authority to spend it. So voters can see new ambulances and school extensions thanks to immigration. The Reform circus can then fade to insignificance and Farrage B. Crumb can cross the Atlantic to lick Trump's spittle.