Yes, yes, it's all still too early to say and there's everything from a Lab majority to a Tory majority to play for.
That said, I'm highly pessimistic about Labour's chances the next time out. They are still structurally disadvantaged by the electoral system, particularly with most of Scotland likely out of reach. The party is still quite divided about what direction it wants to go in, even if those cleavages are muted at the moment due to the pandemic, and Starmer's not really developed much of a leadership profile besides being an unthreatening man in a suit.
Also, I'm baffled at the apparently conventional wisdom that Johnson will step down or is somehow an electoral liability. Despite our fervent wishes, his shtick shows no sign of getting old; by some measures he's actually *more* approved of now than he was on the eve of the 2019 election. He's clearly got political capital and goodwill to spend with the EU transition period over and the COVID vaccine underway. Unless his party sees a staggering blow to its standing (remember, Theresa May wasn't given the boot until the devastating 2019 EU election results) I don't see him going anywhere.
Bluntly, if the Tories weren't turfed out of office in 2017 for austerity and Brexit with a weak leader facing an unexpectedly popular insurgent opposition leader, they're pretty likely to survive with a stronger leader facing a dud with those two acrimonious policies put behind them.
See, I think Labour would have won that election if they had had a leader like Starmer, because the Tory campaign was so awful. Corbyn’s performance was only perceived as strong because he outperformed expectations so much; in absolute terms, it wasn’t that impressive.
