UK By-elections thread, 2021-

[Torrain]

It should also ensure any by-election is held after Uxbridge and Selby, thus potentially prolonging any resultant pain for Johnson's successor.

lmao if Mid Beds is later could Johnson run in Uxbridge, lose, and then be put forward as the candidate for Mid Beds?

Sorry to be boring. But it sounds like candidates are being selected over the next couple of days - with several selection meetings this evening for both Labour and the Conservatives. Even in Mid Beds there’s already a shortlist (lacking Johnson), where the by-election isn’t official yet.

[Torrain]

Bet Ed Davey has an inhumanly wide grin on his face tonight. The set would have been a heavy lift for them in a general election, but it’s a fair sight easier to win than some of their recent by-election pick-ups.

And with a decent incumbent, it’s probably way more winnable in the general next year…

[Torrain]

Isn't Danny Boy Beales a character in EastEnders? 

If he wins, £5 on one of the papers writing up the by-election entitled with some variation of “Boris’ Replacement: Beales is London’s Newest WestEnder.”

[Torrain]

Yeah, the Hands tweet was a bit of a damp squib. Starmer and Rayner cheerily greet the Tory activists in what I thought rather endearing way. All quite sporting, tbh.

But then again, if Hands was a sharp operator, perhaps he wouldn’t have bungled messaging around the locals so badly. If the Tories lose 2-3 of these by-elections, I do wonder whether he might finally fall on his sword, after improbably surviving May.

[Torrain]

8 week suspension for Pincher - above what was being briefed yesterday. Guess the only question now is whether he resigns or waits to be recalled.

[Torrain]

So that I'm following along correctly, if the Tories lose all three seats, it'll be Labour winning U&SR and S&A, while the Lib Dems take S&F?

Aye - that's the conventional wisdom - and where the parties are targeting their resources.

In terms of the prospective by-elections:

• Rutherglen and Hamilton South is a straight SNP-Labour race
• Tamworth is a straight-up Labour-Tory race.
• Mid Beds is more complicated - Labour and the Lib Dems are both making noise about contesting it, and have each sent canvassers.

Edit: If Tamworth and Mid Beds do happen, and coincide - I think there's fair chance of Labour and the Lib Dems divvying them up, one each, like with Tiverton and Wakefield last year.

[Torrain]

Anyone have a place where these are being covered? I thought Sky would but guess not

Sky News are running an election special from midnight BST to 4am, as are the BBC. Both are probably region-locked to the UK, but Sky run a livestream on YouTube, so I’ll link that here just in case.

The Guardian live blog.

The Telegraph live-blog.

The Independent live blog.

[Torrain]

To follow up on that theme…

https://twitter.com/BethRigby/status/1682158497822126081

[Torrain]

Yet another Ferryier cancelled in Scotland.

[Torrain]

https://twitter.com/CllrMcHuntSNP/status/1687433113784242176?s=20
Is this parody?

Yeah, that’s a parody account. It was blocked by Stephen Flynn a few weeks back. A unionist mutual follows it, so it slips into my feed occasionally.

[Torrain]

https://twitter.com/RedfieldWilton/status/1689306849835724801

By-election implications - Labour would be heavily favoured in Rutherglen (and another 15-25 seats, depending on whether swing was national, or more tactical) on those numbers.

R&W have some sampling issues, so take with a pinch of salt. Felt noteworthy though - and their Scottish Lib Dem numbers seem to have come back down from an artificial high a few months back.

[Torrain]

"The Chancellor of the Exchequer has this day appointed Nadine Vanessa Dorries to be Steward and Bailiff of the Three Hundreds of Chiltern."

Huh - Dorries ended up being the one to remove the previous Steward and Bailiff (one Boris Johnson), from his final government-appointed position. Sinecure or not, there’s a tinge of irony to the whole affair.

[Torrain]

Aye, I knew Labour had a relatively good night in the May elections, but could potentially be quite a brusing one, if this data is accurate:https://twitter.com/ElectionMapsUK/status/1698642022846906668

[Torrain]

Senior Conservative MPs briefing that they expect Pincher to resign from the Commons this week - apparently there's now a serious push to get Tamworth and Mid Beds scheduled for the same day.

Only Allegretti at the Guardian, and Michael Crick reporting so far, so *may* just be wishful thinking on the part of the whips.

[Torrain]

Eddie Hughes (sitting MP for Walsall North, and Conservative candidate for Tamworth at the next general election), has confirmed, via Facebook, that he won't contest the Tamworth by-election, or stand down from Walsall North.

I respect the MP for Tamworth's decision to resign today and I understand there will now be a by-election.

However, as the sitting Member of Parliament for Walsall North I have a commitment to my constituents until the next general election. I look forward to continuing to represent the great people of Bloxwich, Willenhall and Walsall North.

Unclear whether he's still their general election candidate, or whether the local association will try and convince a candidate to act as a placeholder for the remaining year or so in this parliament.

[Torrain]

Interesting that the Conservative candidate in Mid Bedfordshire is LDS. Is that at all common in the UK and might it affect the outcome?

We have had a couple of LDS MPs, but I think David Rutley is the only prominent current example. Cool guy that I am, I watched the MPs re-swear their oath to the new king last year, and Rutley brought his copy of the Book of Mormon, which he held, in addition to a King James Bible during the oath.

The religion of candidates doesn't *tend* to come up in these contests - unless there's a local scandal. The independent MP Martin Bell once mounted an (ultimately unsuccessful, but unexpectedly close) campaign against a Tory MP (Eric Pickles) when he was accused of being in the pocket of a local pentecostal church that was muscling in on the local Conservative Association.

Religious conflicts have occasionally arisen (see Respect-era George Galloway), but it's rare to see Christian sectarianism affect politics outside a few hotspots, like Glasgow (there's a thing with Labour adopting a candidate with a history in the Orange Order a few cycles back that's still got some voters hot under the collar), and of course Northern Ireland itself.

[Torrain]

The Scotsman: Sex pest MP Patrick Grady is welcome to campaign in Rutherglen and Hamilton West ahead of by-election, says SNP candidate

I get why Katy Loudon would say Sturgeon was welcome to campaign, despite her difficulties - as she did last week. She is after all, still a grandee, and uncharged. But Patrick Grady?

A Labour or Tory candidate would hardly endorse campaigning with Chris Pincher or Claudia Webbe.

And sure, she tried to hedge. But she still ended up at a straightforward yes.

[Torrain]

The betting markets have moved to show a dead-heat, with Labour poised to pull ahead. Obviously we’re talking about an unscientific, lagging factor. But it does remove one of the few remaining factors the Lib Dems could point to, in order to claim ‘main challenger’ status:
https://twitter.com/ElectionMapsUK/status/1702621524874702870

[Torrain]

In spite of the mixed track record of such things, I'd like to see another poll of Mid Beds.

TFW you know the future

https://twitter.com/ElectionMapsUK/status/1703046374407680508?t=juRPxH78A9OKAtpn...
Though in all honesty,  with the track record of by-elections and constituency polls, this really just tells us it's a three-way. Which was already known.

Polling accuracy aside - surely this is exactly the result Labour would want from a Mid Beds poll. "It's a dead heat, don't vote Lib Dem and let the Tories back in", is campaign gold dust.

They've basically been gifted the perfect figures for a Lib Dem leaflet bar-chart, and they don't even need to mess with the y-axis, it's ideal for them - "only Labour can beat the Tories here".

[Torrain]

Politico’s Ailbhe Rea has a nice run-down of the Rutherglen by-election, with comment from Humza Yousaf, Anas Sarwar, both major candidates, and Prof John Curtice. They’ve even included a round of vox pops for Blair.

The full podcast can be found here: https://www.politico.eu/podcast/the-battle-for-scotland/

Probably not too much new info for regulars of this thread, but a nice primer if you’re coming in fresh.

[Torrain]

STV held a televised debate between the SNP, Labour and Conservative candidates for Rutherglen this evening. As ever, STV loves to let candidates cross-examine each other, so it got a bit punchy:

• Labour’s Michael Shanks took hits over Labour’s reversal on the two-child cap, and had a tightrope to walk on issues where he diverges from London.
• Conservative Thomas Kerr was hauled over the coals for praising Liz Truss, mere days before the fiscal event - and struggled to defend the government’s record.
• The SNP’s Katy Loudon couldn’t answer whether she supported further council tax rises, and was criticised for pledging to put the party line first.

Write-up here. If it’s posted to YouTube, I’ll share the link.

The Lib Dem candidate was invited, but “chose not to attend” - Lib-Lab non-aggression pact?

[Torrain]

Some UK constituencies get nice line graphs on their wikipedia page. But Rutherglen isn't among them, so here's one I made earlier:



SNP/Labour vote-share (and switchers between the two blocs) will clearly dominate the coverage. But I'll be particuarly curious just how much the Conservative vote is squeezed by.

Since the seat's 2005 creation, they've always maintained their deposit, and benefitted from the party's rise in fortunes since 2016. Holding onto their position requires convincing voters they're the defacto unionist voice. If Thursday is a *good* night for Labour, the central pillar of their appeal will be seriously undermined. 

Conversely, if they hold up, but Labour gains at the SNP's expense, it'll be an interesting data point that could offer a window onto how areas like Ayrshire play next year, where Tories are in a solid second place (see this week's by-election for an anecdotally example of them holding up, relative to the national picture). Conservatives don't have much room to *grow*, but if there's a significant SNP -> Lab switch, they could end up in some weird three-way marginal territory that produces a couple of surprise upsets.

[Torrain]

Thought I might also put a graph together for each of the the following week's by-elections. I've included the minor parties for Tamworth, which was created in 1997.


Mid Beds has been around in some form since 1918, so I've only included the big three (and the SDP), because there's about 10 different minor parties, which means about half the graph is just distinguishing the Monster Raving Loony Party from the Liberals and the various eurosceptic parties. Only UKIP saved a deposit in that time (coming third place in 2015), and they're not going to be a factor this time.

I've gone back that far, because I wanted to visualise the Liberal presence in the seat, given their insistence they're the best placed to win.

[Torrain]

Yeah. It's not exactly a show of confidence. Compare that with the victory lap Labour are taking in the Guardian today:

Labour insiders have described the Rutherglen and Hamilton West byelection this week as the biggest vote since the last election, amid notable confidence they will win the seat from the SNP.

The claim has been made in internal discussions before the vote on Thursday, with Keir Starmer’s most senior advisers regarding it as by far the most important of three byelection campaigns currently under way. There will now be “a deluge” of activists and shadow cabinet ministers visiting the seat before polling day.

Officials are unusually optimistic about securing the seat after seeing a significant movement in the “promise rate” recorded by canvassers – marking the number of voters saying they will vote Labour. Canvassers have reported that previously undecided voters now say they will back Starmer.

Of course, this could be hubris. But it's starting to seem like this thing is locked down. The fact the SNP Chief Whip has been admonishing MSPs for refusing to campaign there is hardly a good sign for them either.

[Torrain]

It’s been leaked that cuts to Police Scotland in the upcoming Holyrood budget would see all three remaining police stations in Rutherglen and Hamilton West closed.

Apparently the proposals have been in the works for a while, but someone’s gone nuclear at the last possible moment, and sent the details to a certain tabloid.