Sir John Curtice has warned Labour that the result of the next election is not set in stone amid a much more volatile political climate and anti-government sentiment.
At a fringe event organised by the think tank Demos at last week’s Labour Party conference, Curtice assessed the party’s performance at the general election and discussed the road ahead to the next election in 2029.
Curtice analysed the key objectives the party had over the last parliament and in the run-up to the general election; in particular making Labour electable, reconnecting with traditional working-class Labour voters and making the party’s vote more geographically efficient.
Looking closer at the election result, Curtice reminded people that, despite Labour’s landslide victory, the party secured the lowest share of the vote for any majority government in British political history.
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He also said that the evidence from the election result suggested an anti-government sentiment among voters, regardless of the colour of government in their part of the country.
“Being in government was bad news in July,” he explained.
“The Conservatives got a walloping from the electorate, the SNP got a very substantial rebuff, but so did Labour in Wales, where it is responsible for the devolved parliament.
“This is an election which is very easy to read as simply and primarily an election about rejection of certainly the UK Conservative government and about governments more widely.
“That raises the question about the extent to which people were voting for Labour as opposed to using Labour to express their discontent with the current government.”
‘Reform made the biggest gains among working class voters’
Labour did achieve some of its objectives, Curtice said, in particular changing its image to be seen as more moderate by the electorate. He also said some progress was made in convincing the electorate that the party was ready for government.
Crucially, however, the veteran pollster said that data suggests that Labour did not make a significant breakthrough in winning working class voters, noting that the party that saw the biggest jump in support among C2DE voters was Reform UK.
“There is no difference between working class and middle class voters, as was the case in 2019, in willingness to vote Labour. Equally, for the Conservative Party, there is very little relationship between class and vote,” Sir John explained.
“Which is the party, relatively speaking, the most successful amongst working class voters? It is Reform UK.”
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The death of two-party politics?
Curtice said that there is a low level of trust in politicians among the electorate, which has not changed since the election of a Labour government in July.
One of the things that he said Labour could do to try and build back trust is to improve the NHS.
“Reversing the public policy failures of the last five years will also be a crucial part of the trust agenda, as well as thinking about where you take money from,” he added.
Does the fractured nature of the election result, with the two main parties getting less than 60 percent of the vote combined, represent the beginning of the end of the two-party system? Curtice said it was not out of the question.
“This is the lowest combined share of the two parties at any election since and including 1922. The thing to think about is this – this is a tough gig this government is going to inherit and maintaining the confidence of the electorate, an electorate which never really bought into it, is difficult.
“You could see this government could easily run into trouble. We can also see that it is possible the Conservative Party might take a while to recover – certainly at the moment they are going nowhere.
“You can already see in the opinion polls, support for the Liberal Democrats is up, support for the Greens is up and support for Reform UK is up.
“Much will depend on the ability of the opposition parties to frame a narrative that explains why Labour is doing badly in their view and why you can’t trust the Conservatives.”
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Constructing a narrative of the future
When asked to put on his strategist hat and say what Labour should do, Curtice said that a message that says “everything is terrible and it is all the other lot’s fault” without an attempt to construct a narrative about the future would go down badly as “that is not what the public want to hear”.
Curtice said: “The question I would have is whether or not Keir Starmer has the ability to construct that narrative. Rishi Sunak couldn’t construct that narrative, I certainly don’t think Sir Keir constructed that narrative during the election. The question is whether he has the political ability to do so.”
Curtice’s crystal ball for 2029
What is Curtice’s prediction for 2029? “The most crucial lesson of the last parliament is to not to attempt to forecast the outcome of the next election on the basis of the last one,” he said.
“I think it’s very, very uncertain. The next election could end up being more fragmented than the last one. February 1974 with hindsight proved to be a really crucial election, when the Liberal Party started fighting everywhere. The question is whether 50 years later, is that again a crucial stepping stone and we may say this is when two-party politics disappeared.
“It depends on events, it depends on the success of this government and it depends on the ability of the opposition.
Curtice noted that, following the election, there are now only a minority of constituencies where the Conservatives and Labour share first and second place.
He did make one prediction about a future election, however. “For those fighting devolved elections or even fighting council elections, don’t bet on necessarily doing well in 12 months or two years time.”
Recap on all of the news and debate from party conference 2024 by LabourList here.
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