Could the next Labor majority exceed 1997?

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How's Labour polling in Scotland?  Because that'd obviously be key to repeating or excelling 1997...

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Even if you put aside the methodological issues, Sunak isn't the 'safe pair of hands' that Callaghan, Major and Brown all were to much of the electorate - their respective doomed governments clawed back support once an election was on the horizon.

Still didn't save any of them.

What *did* "save" them from greater annihilation, though, was that they already had so much vestigially bombproof incumbency in place which, thanks to localism and often for lack of a galvanized and "trustworthy" alternative, wound up holding on, even if by greatly reduced shares and margins.  And even on the losing end, the same can be said about Michael Foot's Labour in '83--and particularly how they did, seatwise, vs the Lib/SDP Alliance.  (It also explains why, in France, the Macronistas fell short of the mega-mega-sweep many were anticipating in the second round of legislative voting in 2017.)

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Any poll that shows Reform UK as an outsized "determining factor" should be treated as dicey, given how they've underperformed expectations in virtually every byelection or local recently (or the general pattern of drastic e-day falloff that's plagued UKIP and Brexit in the past)

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2.  Polarization while not as bad as US, is larger than in past so winning in constituencies Tories won by 40 points in 2019 seems unlikely.

It’s absolutely not. In the post-war period our 2 major parties used to get 90% of the vote together and elections were usually quite close and voting patterns semi-stable. A key feature of modern British elections is how the electorate have next to no absolute loyalty to political parties, if you piss them off then they will go elsewhere. 4 years ago the Conservatives came 5th in a national election with 9% of the vote and then months later won a landslide with 44% of the vote. That’s not a stable, partisan electorate. Labour won’t be winning many constituencies with 40% Conservative majorities, but the suggestion they will is largely down to crap MRP (a consistent feature has been a flattening of party support, the one above has Labour’s vote falling in its safest seats despite absolutely surging in safe Tory seats).

Obviously British voters are not at all like American voters, but with the erosion of traditional partisan loyalties they resemble Canadian voters a lot more than they used to. What this would suggest is that in a landslide election of the sort that we might get, there would be a lot of very unexpected seats falling to Labour.

Let's remember that it's a different kind of polarization these days--more of an urban/rural sorting thing than the class/cultural-based polarization of old.  But *also* compared to the postwar years, there's more elbow room for dissident options, Lib Dems not excluded (but also including independent/localist forces in local elections).

And the sorting is such is that the "lot of very unexpected seats" would probably be propelled by Labour votes in "expected" locations (i.e. urban centres within rural constituencies).

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Anyway, the two reasons to be sceptical of a larger Labour majority than 1997 are a) the fact that, no matter what happens, Labour will not be winning every single seat but one in Central and urban Scotland, and b) Labour has shown no sign of appealing particularly to typical middle class voters in 'Middle England' in any actual elections. They do not need either to win a majority or even to win a large majority, but they would do in order to top 1997.

How are you actually defining this?

Some of their Midlands results last month surely weren't bad in this regard.

Maybe it's more by way of "active" vs "passive"?  (That is, any likely Middle England appeal being more swept-up-in-the-wave happenstance--and perhaps, yes, with reinforcement by favourable spot local results--than part of a total-domination national strategy)

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And to be fair to him he has made Labour seem acceptable to a lot of voters who voted Tory in the last election to prevent a Labour gov.

Which is another way of saying: if Labour could have done as well as it did w/*Corbyn* as leader, maybe it's a bigger voter tent than some give credit for.  Or, the kind of big tent that New Labour under Blair represented might not have been simply a fluke of the moment.

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And to be fair to him he has made Labour seem acceptable to a lot of voters who voted Tory in the last election to prevent a Labour gov.

Which is another way of saying: if Labour could have done as well as it did w/*Corbyn* as leader, maybe it's a bigger voter tent than some give credit for.  Or, the kind of big tent that New Labour under Blair represented might not have been simply a fluke of the moment.

I think Labour could have won 2017 with a better leader but that was only close as May ran a disastrous campaign.  If she ran a decent one, results would have looked more like 2019 than 2017.  2019 I think was unwinnable due to Brexit but a better leader could have probably kept Tories to either a bare majority thus wouldn't have lasted the full term or another hung parliament with Tories being largest party.  If Tories + DUP less than half, would have forced another vote on EU membership and possible Brexit cancelled.

But even beyond May (or Corbyn), the message might have been that the Labour *brand* wasn't as toxic, from a modern-day natural-governing-party perspective, as imagined.  And that non-toxicity's playing out in the form of Sir Keir.

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But even beyond May (or Corbyn), the message might have been that the Labour *brand* wasn't as toxic, from a modern-day natural-governing-party perspective, as imagined.  And that non-toxicity's playing out in the form of Sir Keir.

The whole 'Labour isn't Labour' thing that was pretty deafening in certain circles throughout 2019 it came up so often has turned out to be something of a blessing in disguise, as it meant the Party brand itself was shielded from association with a deeply unpopular leadership.

Or while 1983's "longest suicide note" aura pertained to the party in general, its 2019 equivalent was very much leadership-contained.

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If there is a 2010-esque result, which minor parties does Labour likely work with?

(this is wishcasting for my dream of a Labour-Plaid Cymru coalition)

Actually, here's a different kind of speculation: that a Lab-Lib Dem deal might work out to be not nearly so disastrous for the Lib Dems as Cameron-Clegg was...