No matter what poll you look at, the ruling Conservative Party appears headed for a catastrophic defeat. One poll in particular has captured everyone’s attention. Conducted by Savanta for the Telegraph, it predicts that Labour will beat the Conservatives (also known as the Tories) by 21 points. The polling firm’s analysis suggests Labour could win more than 500 seats (out of 650 in the House of Commons), with the Conservatives getting barely 50.
That would amount to the fewest seats won by the Conservative Party since its founding in 1834. According to projections, many of Britain’s senior-most cabinet ministers would lose in their own constituencies, including Rishi Sunak, who could become the first sitting prime minister to be so humiliated. I should caution that other models relying on different data don’t expect the results to be this bad for the Conservatives, but they still forecast a crushing defeat.
This fall from grace is particularly stunning because in the last British elections, in 2019, the Tories gained a majority of 365, the largest since the Margaret Thatcher years, and Labour had its worst night at the polls since 1935.
What explains the Conservative debacle? Rory Stewart, a former Tory politician and author of a brilliant memoir “How Not to Be a Politician,” argues that over the past decade the Conservative Party lost one of its most treasured attributes: seriousness. “The Labour Party has usually been seen as well-meaning, with its heart in the right place, but feckless, rash and often incompetent. The Tories were seen as tough, even heartless, but assuredly competent. That reputation has been trashed by the chaos of Boris Johnson, Theresa May, et al.,” he said to me.
But it is more than just incompetence. The Conservatives face a problem that afflicts the right almost everywhere. What do they stand for? Since 2010, the Tories presented themselves under David Cameron as the party of traditional fiscal conservatism (which meant austerity), then pivoted to Trump-style populism under Boris Johnson, and then Thatcherite free-market ideology under Liz Truss. Recently, the populist hard-right Reform UK Party led by Nigel Farage has been climbing in the polls — and dividing the conservative vote, which might give Labour an even larger parliamentary majority than it already would have gotten.
As I have argued before, politics is moving away from the left-right divide over economics to an open-closed one centered on cultural issues such as immigration, identity and multiculturalism. As the Tories remain internally divided on these issues, Reform presents itself squarely as advocating a more “closed” Britain. Assuming the Tories do suffer a humiliating defeat, it’s conceivable that Farage will find a way to take over the Conservative Party and make it thoroughly populist (as Trump has done with the Republicans).
So the right in Britain is divided, unlike Republicans, who are united around Trump. But the real lesson of these elections might be for the American left. In Britain, many see this election as a negative vote against the Conservative government rather than an affirmative vote for Labour leader Keir Starmer. He is not a thrilling, charismatic personality, and he has a lower approval rating than Tony Blair had when he won big in 1997. But Starmer has been a brilliant strategist in his positioning of the Labour Party. Fraser Nelson, the editor of the Spectator, a legendary Tory publication, said to me, “The best argument in Starmer’s favor is that he would handle the country as strategically and effectively as he has handled the Labour Party.” Stewart pointed out that by occupying the center, Starmer has forced the Conservatives further right, where there are fewer votes.
Starmer took over the party from Jeremy Corbyn, a hard-left ideologue who faced numerous accusations of antisemitism. Starmer purged the party of radicals, eschewed any hint of a woke agenda, and has kept Labour firmly trained on the center ground of economic growth and better governmental services. Labour has mostly accepted the budget cuts proposed by the current Conservative government and is planning no major new taxes. Starmer has ruled out a return to the European Union, probably because he knows that any prospect of open migration from the continent would cede the crucial issue of immigration to the right. In fact, in his televised debate with Sunak, he attacked the Tories from the right, accusing Sunak of being “the most liberal prime minister we’ve ever had on immigration.”
To me, the lesson from Britain is that for the left to win it must stake out the center ground, ensure especially that it cannot be outflanked on immigration, and steer clear of overly ideological, woke politics that alienate many voters. It is not a strategy that wins plaudits from the base. But it is likely to win elections, which is more important.
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