UK By-elections thread, 2021-

[Blair]

Oh my god the Tories can’t find anyone to do their morning broadcast round as Dowden (Tory Party Chair) has quit over the results.

[Blair]

My first thought was that Wakefield could have been a lot worse for them.

It was a very good result for Labour, but wasn’t as much of a blowout as Tiverton. I expect the Independent candidate (an ex Tory Cllr who won a Labour ward in the locals) who got 8% meant there wasn’t as a huge lead for Labour.

But if you said a Labour majority of virtually 5K at the start of the race Labour would be happy and it is the historic vote share the party has got since the 2000s- I imagine it is a very different coalition though!

[Blair]

Well it’s a take!

https://mobile.twitter.com/DavidGHFrost/status/1540218121943916550?ref_src=twsrc...

[YL]

Well it’s a take!

https://mobile.twitter.com/DavidGHFrost/status/1540218121943916550?ref_src=twsrc...

A particularly interesting take given that @labour is the Irish Labour Party.

[Blair]

I still think they should have split the by-elections- if they had Wakefield first it would have been easier to spin but two on one night makes it’s easier to box off bullsh**t excuses.

They’re trying to argue that Labours swing was too small, but the much larger liberal swing doesn’t matter…

Raab in on Radio 4 jabbering about a pact between the two parties- a bit late for that.

[Torrain]

So Labour’s vote-share in Wakefield appears to believe  the best it’s been since the national landslide of 2001, and they have the largest numerical majority they’ve had since 2005 (on a much smaller turnout).

Meanwhile the Lib Dems became the first non-Tory party to win the land around T&H since the 19th century,  before the universal franchise and existence of the Labour Party.

Big night.

[Benjamin Frank]

Lib-Demmanium!

[YL]

Meanwhile the Lib Dems became the first non-Tory party to win the land around T&H since the 19th century,  before the universal franchise and existence of the Labour Party.

Just the land around Honiton: the Tiverton constituency voted Liberal twice in 1923, once in a by-election and once (by three votes) in the General Election later in the year.

Honiton itself was a Parliamentary Borough until 1868 and had Whig/Liberal MPs, though it always had a Tory as well.  The surrounding countryside, however, including the coastal towns, was in the South Devon division which was Tory from 1835.  Areas now in the East Devon constituency (most of that constituency, actually, except the bits in the City of Exeter) retain the record.

I don't know why this area is so ancestrally Tory; was it very Anglican by West Country standards?

[Property Representative of the Harold Holt Swimming Centre]

There's a polling phenomenon that was once prevalent but seems to have died a death: the Lib Dems getting a major surge after an upset by-election win. Didn't happen after North Shropshire, Chesham and Amersham etc and presumably won't happen now. Another one is the party conference bounce. Neither by-elections nor party conferences are treated as the big deal by the media that they used to be so this perhaps isn't surprising.

[Benjamin Frank]

There's a polling phenomenon that was once prevalent but seems to have died a death: the Lib Dems getting a major surge after an upset by-election win. Didn't happen after North Shropshire, Chesham and Amersham etc and presumably won't happen now. Another one is the party conference bounce. Neither by-elections nor party conferences are treated as the big deal by the media that they used to be so this perhaps isn't surprising.

In the year since the Chesham an Amersham by-election, the Liberal Democrats have gone from around 7% to 13% in the polls.

[Blair]

I’m very bored of people thinking they’re smart and alternative by saying these results are fine because Thatcher and Major lost by-elections.

So did Brown and Callaghan…

[Cassius]

There's a polling phenomenon that was once prevalent but seems to have died a death: the Lib Dems getting a major surge after an upset by-election win. Didn't happen after North Shropshire, Chesham and Amersham etc and presumably won't happen now. Another one is the party conference bounce. Neither by-elections nor party conferences are treated as the big deal by the media that they used to be so this perhaps isn't surprising.

I think it’s also the case that whilst people are happy to treat the Lib Dems as a receptacle for protest/tactical votes in by-elections, the party’s participation in the Coalition and subsequent attitude towards the EU debate have put a fairly hard ceiling on the party’s national polling prospects - they can no longer be all things to all people.

That said, as Frank pointed out they have drifted upwards into the low teens over the last six months, which presumably is the result of them peeling off a segment of ‘liberal’ Tories who were previously willing to give Johnson the benefit of the doubt.

[CumbrianLefty]

Christopher Jones (Northern Independence Party) 84

Not the most important result from Wakefield, but still - LOL.

(which of course hasn't stopped their online claque saying what a terrible Labour result it was)

[EastAnglianLefty]

The efficiency of the LD votes in by-elections this Parliament is remarkable. In every by-election that they've stood in, they've either won or lost their deposit. More than 95% of votes cast for LDs in by-elections have gone to winning candidates. This is utterly unprecedented.

[CumbrianLefty]

Pro-Labour swing in Wakefield just beat that of Corby in 2012.

Given the less than auspicious start to their campaign there, I think they will take that.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

They’re trying to argue that Labours swing was too small

Which is hilarious as a 12.8pt swing is very large. I see they're sticking to the deranged like from Jenkyns on the night that a swing has to be 17.5pts (LOL) or it doesn't count. Amazing levels of cope.

[Torrain]

Christopher Jones (Northern Independence Party) 84

Not the most important result from Wakefield, but still - LOL.

(which of course hasn't stopped their online claque saying what a terrible Labour result it was)

My favourite NIP stat is that their “vote NIP” tweet got more likes than they got votes in Wakefield, which tells you all you need to know…

[CumbrianLefty]

"Worst Labour result in Wakefield since 1931" is the deathless take of Very Online Left Twitter.

[YL]

It wouldn't be a Lib Dem by-election gain without a stunt the following day


(picture from the Guardian)

[Blair]

Should have driven an orange tractor through a blue wall.

[Penn_Quaker_Girl]

I had no idea how monumental this by-election result is in the context of UK election history.  

The constituency of Tiverton and Honiton has existed in current form since 1997 (with the merger of separate constituencies of Tiverton / Honiton).  

As others have noted, Tiverton had been represented by a Conservative MP since 1924 (or 1931, depending on party label).  

The region of Honiton had returned a Conservative MP since 1885.  We're talking pre-Jack-the-Ripper days (1888).  

[Blair]

We have a new line from the Conservatives!

They only lost because Conservative voters stayed at home.

[CumbrianLefty]

We have a new line from the Conservatives!

They only lost because Conservative voters stayed at home.

New? That "line" is genuinely as old as the hills

(and the lower turnout in more left leaning Wakefield suggests the opposite if anything)

[afleitch]

If we look at English by-elections (and excluding Southend West) we have the following average vote share changes

Conservative: -10.7%
Labour -4.4%
Lib Dem +11.4%

These elections also include Hartlepool (the first by-election; a Conservative gain) and Batley and Spen (intervention).

Without Hartlepool (a reverse intervention), the Tory vote drops on average by 15.5

If we look at the same picture in the 1992-1997 Parliament, but only during the years Blair was leader of the Labour Party, the Tory share dropped by 17.7 points on average (Labour up 13.9, Lib Dems down 2.0). These were contests on more favourable seats for Labour than the current crops of seats up for election.

So the Tory share is as down by almost as much as it was during the period in which they were heading for the exit.

The Lib Dem gains now are even more impressive given that in most seats they are recovering from relative historic lows for a third party.

[EastAnglianLefty]

If we look at English by-elections (and excluding Southend West) we have the following average vote share changes

Conservative: -10.7%
Labour -4.4%
Lib Dem +11.4%

These elections also include Hartlepool (the first by-election; a Conservative gain) and Batley and Spen (intervention).

Without Hartlepool (a reverse intervention), the Tory vote drops on average by 15.5

If we look at the same picture in the 1992-1997 Parliament, but only during the years Blair was leader of the Labour Party, the Tory share dropped by 17.7 points on average (Labour up 13.9, Lib Dems down 2.0). These were contests on more favourable seats for Labour than the current crops of seats up for election.

So the Tory share is as down by almost as much as it was during the period in which they were heading for the exit.

The Lib Dem gains now are even more impressive given that in most seats they are recovering from relative historic lows for a third party.

Though is that Lib Dem average that meaningful? In three out of elections they got more than 45% of the vote, in the remaining five they couldn't break 4%. It's a pattern of really striking advances where they're the most plausible anti-Tory option and absolutely nothing where they aren't.