Theresa May obviously made a catastrophic decision April 18 to call an election. Polling at the time suggested that Conservatives would substantially increase their very small majority, and in particular would gain modest income seats in the Midlands and North. That’s because she made a big point of saying that she wanted policies that would help people just “getting by.”
I was in Britain May 14 to 18, spending time in the Midlands around Birmingham and the North East around Newcastle. The Conservative campaign featured Theresa May in capital letters and Conservatives in minuscule type. Her theme was “strong and stable,” repeated almost robotically. In her statement after winning her constituency of Maidenhead, she talked about the importance of keeping the Conservative party—not quite the personal appeal that was being made five weeks ago.
The Conservative manifesto was unveiled on May 18. It included a provision on “social care” which would net the government some of the money it spends on care for the disabled elderly, by recouping all but £100,000 of decedents’ money when they died. Economically, this was progressive, placing costs on people with high net worth. But it was quickly labeled the “dementia tax,” and May quickly made a U-turn renouncing it (without quite admitting that).
This, plus the decision to call the election — which she had said repeatedly she would not do — undermined her claim to be “strong and stable.” Instead, as the Labour party claimed, she looked “weak and wobbly.” This undermined all the other provisions she had advanced to help modest income people—particularly in the working class Labour-held seats she had targeted.
There is some irony to the fact that both major parties had leaders who had supported Remain in the June 2016 referendum in which 52 percent of British voters, with record turnout, voted to Leave the European Union. When she became Conservative Party leader and Prime Minister, May stated solidly, “Brexit means Brexit.” Labour party leader Jeremy Corbyn continued to downplay the issue, leaving the idea he was for a “soft Brexit.”
The Conservatives’ idea was that if the 2015 Ukip vote, 12.9 percent of the popular vote, went solidly for Conservatives, that would propel them even farther ahead of their 2015 plurality of 38 to 31 percent over the Labour party. But the returns overall show that Ukip’s plummet to irrelevance produced more in the way of gains for Labour than for Conservatives. The Conservative percentage of popular vote, as I write, is up 5.6 percent, while Labour’s is up 9.5 percent.
The election heralds a return toward the traditional two-party politics of Britain. As those 2015 number show, Britain has had relatively low percentages for the two major parties. This year, the Ukip vote has plummeted to 1.9 percent of the popular vote. It’s a classic example of what happens to a political movement when it achieves its goals: voters discard it and move on.
Thus in the United States when conservatives (mostly) achieved great policy success on crime and welfare in the 1990s, those issues stopped working from Republicans. Similarly, the Liberal Democrats who in 2015 lost the great majority of their seats after serving in the coalition government with David Cameron’s Conservatives, have also not bounced much back, except in Scotland where they (but less than the Conservatives) won seats from the Scottish Nationalists, who had won 56 of 59 Scotland’s seats in 2015. Jeremy Goodall, a commentator on Sky News, noted that the two major parties each won more than 40 percent in the last election, in the 1970s, before the United Kingdom joined the European Union, and that they have done so again only now that Britain decided to leave the European Union. Coincidence?
The Labour party also benefited from the widespread assumption that they had no chance to win. For many voters, that meant you could vote for a party led by the astonishingly leftist—and terrorist-sympathizing and antisemitism-sympathizing—Jeremy Corbyn, without really putting him in control of the government. I suspect this helped him with Remain voters in upscale districts, especially in metropolitan London and the very high-income areas in the south of England who voted for Remain.
The Conservative Party was founded when Benjamin Disraeli led rebels against Prime Minister Robert Peel’s repeal of the Corn Laws (i.e., installation of free trade). The internal culture of the party is one of ousting its leaders—which suggests that Theresa May’s tenure as Prime Minister and party leader is limited. She may stay in, since Brexit negotiations begin in 11 days. But she is not likely to last all that long.
And to remain in power, Theresa May needed help from the Celtic fringe. Under Margaret Thatcher and her successors, the Conservative party lost its historic support in Scotland, and at one point had no seats there. But the Scottish National party’s sweep of 56 of 59 seats in 2015 ousted dozens of Labour members and set the stage for Scottish Conservative leader Ruth Davidson to gain 11 seats there this year, to 7 for Labour. Conservatives also won more popular votes than Labour in Scotland—a huge change from the times when Margaret Thatcher’s name was mud north of the border. (Tthe last time Scotland gave Conservatives a plurality was in 1959 when the Scots-descended Harold Macmillan the Conservative party leader.)
In addition, if appears as likely at this time, Conservatives end up short of the 326 majority of 650 seats, they will be able to form a government because of Northern Ireland, which has its own local parties. The seven Sinn Fein members elected there will not, in line with that party’s traditions, take their seats in the Westminster Parliament, which means the effective majority will be 322. That would leave the Conservatives, with apparently 316-18 seats, could govern with the support of the DUP, the Unionist Northern Ireland party which won 10 seats there.
Another point: This election was a victory for Unionism. There won’t be another Scottish independence referendum any time soon—or maybe in most people’s lifetimes. Another election soon? Quite possibly. My bet on the next Conservative party leader? A lot of people are saying, Boris Johnson. I might place a bet on the Brexit minister, David Davis.
