Labour's Mandate: Thoughts on the UK Election

I happened to be in the UK during the election and I was impressed by the overall dignity and decorum of British politics. It wasn't perfect. The Tories raised all kinds of false spectres in a vain effort to ward off the scope of their inevitable defeat. There was a scandal involving sitting politicians gambling on the election (one labour candidate seems to have tried to short himself, betting on his opponent), and the expected racist fiasco coming out of the new Reform UK. Overall -- and perhaps because the election was a foregone conclusion -- there was little of the Boris Johnston effect. Much of the commentary has focused both on the size of Labour's victory in terms of elected representation and its supposed absent mandate in terms of its popular vote. I think this was a good election for Labour and not simply because they won. I think it provides Labour with an opportunity to refashion Britain for what is now clearly a post-Brexit age along lines something other than the "new Labour" of Tony Blair. There are a number of significant points that follow from the election. 

First, the issue for Labour might not be the overall size of their popular vote (however important this can be), but the fact that they won in virtually all key geographic regions they needed to. The British electorate appears deeply divided, something that should not surprise us and something that is not a horrible thing.  I would argue that a divided electorate represents actual divisions in society and that an organized response to this on the part of Labour is preferable to a false sense of popular unity. For Labour, what was significant was not that they took advantage of a divided electorate but that they were able to defeat different opponents in different regions. They took Scottish central belt from SNP, retook the northern "red wall" from the Brexit Conservatives, and pushed back Reform UK in southern Wales and urban northeast. They drove the Tories out of urban London and recaptured the industrial/post-industrial northern and midlands. Moreover, they finished second in an impressive number of seats, suggesting that they have not exhausted their growth potential.  (Wikipedia has a map of second place finishes.) 

What this means is that Labour is, in important ways, the architect of its own victories. With the SNP on the run (despite what its proponents say), the Tories disorganized, and Reform largely kept off the board, the main opposition will come from moderate centrist Liberal Democrats. For Labour this not a horrible thing. Labour is not competitive everywhere and this is where their low popular vote really shows.  Rural southern England was a battle between the Lib Dems and the Tories; they have no real supporters in Northern Ireland, and the strongest Scottish unionists still prefer the Tories. What all this means, though, -- and this is why Labour should be in a good mood -- is that they fought a multi-front electoral campaign against different opponents and won the battle on the ground. 

Second, the Tories are left with a question and it is the same question that confronted American Republicans and Canadian Conservatives. Is an inclusive conservatism possible? In Canada, we are seeing something of a wave of nostalgia for Brian Mulroney's government, at least among political historians. I've been struggling to understand why. The answer, I think, is that Mulroney's PCs represented that last real effort to build a diverse and inclusive conservatism in Canada. At some future time I'll go back over that history to consider what ultimately made that project impossible. For now, however, we likely should take Mulroney at his word. He supported Charter rights, looked to build a big-tent conservatism that ditched its grass roots opposition to bilingualism and multiculturalism while respecting regionalism and promoting some kind of green politics. Let's not get too far ahead of ourselves. I don't think I share this nostalgia, but I think I see its appeal. Mulroney's government -- and the figures who tried to keep his form of conservatism alive -- believed a diverse, inclusive conservatism possible. 

In Canada, the Harper agenda pushed away this idea and Poilieve has -- and will, if elected -- go further. In the US and France, this connection of conservatism with intolerance is even more advanced (and, my list is not complete). The Tories under Sunak tried to position themselves differently than under Johnston and that positioning was a gamble. That gamble wasn't just unfavourable electoral conditions befalling a government that had been in power for an oddly long (and unstable) time. The gamble was that one could shift British Toryism away from name-calling and toward a broadly inclusive centre-right movement. I don't know what will happen next for theTories, but this gamble is not off to a good start. 

Third, Reform UK was Reform UK. A few of its candidates were shocked that there were racists in the party but no one should be. Reform represented a peal away from the Tories but it also represented something else: the creation of a new intolerant political movement. Some Tories seem to feel that this movement can be folded back into the Tories but it is not clear -- to me at least -- that Reform supporters were good Tories to begin with. I suspect, most found themselves into Reform through the fraying boundaries of the Brexit Party and the shadow of UKIP that still floats about British politics. Said differently, folding Reform UK into the Tories would likely mean -- ideologically at least -- the reverse: folding the Tories into Reform. In this case, it is not clear that one could simply add the two votes together (Reform and Tories) and see how many seats that might have won. 

Why? Well, like the Republican voter base in the US, I suspect that there are a heck of a lot of Tories who (1) accept intolerance as a good thing and won't jump ship because someone points out that their party is drifting to populism, but (2) there are voters who will not move to the Tories (say, Lib Dem or SNP voters) and that will continue a split electorate. There are moderate Tories who will sit on their hands or consider other options (like the Lib Dems). 

Fourth, what about the SNP? They took a real kick and find themselves in a position similar to the BQ in Canada. They are a party with a purpose but without a potential means to that purpose. The influx of Labour and Lib Dem MPs combined with the remaining Tories likely means that the SNP has no chance of winning another referendum and they may not want to even try. Losing a second referendum (as the PQ discovered in Quebec) deflected separatism for a generation and brought to light new political formations (like the CAQ). The SNP has also discovered what others separatist parties in government discover: that policies other than independence count. Said differently, if one is not a good government, getting voted back in because of independence is no guarantee of victory. 

Overall, then, it is easy to be critical of the Labour victory, but I'd rather have a victory than a defeat. I'd rather be Labour, than the SNP, Reform UK, or the Tories. Victory gives Labour a chance to build a different kind of Britain. I hope they take it.