The UK Election

I surprised myself with my last blog about UK politics back in May. At the time, fog surrounded all predictions, yet I scored something like nine out of ten by anticipating Boris as prime minister and most of his actions since, culminating in a general election as an active policy. At the time, I predicted a landslide win for Boris in that election. Has anything changed in the interim?

Boris has actually been even more cunning than I gave him credit for. Ignore all of the lost commons votes and apparent chaos – that has all been part of the plan. Where he has outperformed my expectation is that he has actually negotiated a brexit deal with the EU, so that he can go to the country with a clear and simple platform that nobody can claim is not deliverable. Securing this, yet also securing an election but no second referendum, has been a masterstroke. It carries just one risk – Nigel Farage – but I believe that will be overcome as well.

This is a fascinating election, if one can look beyond the tragic state of the country and its politicians and the prospects for both. Most elections are about a hundred or so marginal seats, with preordained results in up to 80% of the constituencies. That favours incumbent parties, and means that few elections transform the electoral map. In the 1920’s, Labour usurped the Liberals. In 1945, Labour became fully established. In 2010, the Scottish Nationalists usurped Labour in Scotland. That is about it really.

But this election might be different. Outside of Scotland and Northern Ireland, almost all the seats are potentially up for grabs. The main immediate cause is Brexit, but the more fundamental shifts may be about the secular decline of Labour, the nationalist takeover of the Conservatives, and the rise of the Greens.

In a gross simplification of English and Welsh constituencies, most are either natural Conservative or natural Labour. The former comprises the whole south except the grittier parts of London and the most rural parts of the north; the latter gritty London, the whole of Wales and the rest of the north. What is interesting is that the centrist party, the liberals, tend to come second in Conservative seats, and have been most competitive in rural areas where the establishment is feared. In most natural Labour seats, it is the Conservatives who have come second, often a very distant second.

As a result the effect of Brexit and nationalism is skewed. Brexit is a nationalist urge strongest in poorer areas. In natural Labour seats a nationalist Tory party suddenly becomes competitive. In natural Conservative seats, the Liberals may become more competitive, but only where the remain vote was really strong such as around London and in posh university cities like Cambridge.

So in this election it is conceivable that the Conservatives might be competitive in almost every seat in England (and almost no seat outside England, which may not worry them too much because that is only about 12% of the total). It is even possible that they become more successful in traditional Labour seats than their own, achieving a reversal never seen in Britain before.

This is the context for an election where strange things might happen. Boris has a simple platform. He has his party committed to his Brexit deal, he has offered his bribes, and he can hint about a post-Brexit economy of low deregulation and parasitic finance, an attractive proposition for the wealthy and plenty of opinion formers, probably including Trump’s acolytes and the Russians. There will be some trumped up incident relating to immigrants to enable plenty of dog whistling. This is a formidable force.

Labour is offering a new referendum after a further negotiation, and otherwise a highly progressive agenda full of nationalisation and punishment of the rich, from a party obviously divided internally and trying to straddle its traditional voter base and radical London-centred young voters too. This is a tough challenge, made more so by a volatile leadership. Somehow in 2017 Labour outperformed, but that was against Theresa May. Now they have a cynical and aggressive Boris and all his vocal support against them. A total collapse is not impossible: it happened in Scotland (where the SNP will sweep the board again), so why not in England too?

The Liberals would cancel Brexit altogether, though they are smart enough to allow for a referendum if they are forced into coalition. This is also a clear and attractive platform, and they have just about recovered their brand after the battering from being in coalition (tough for what was historically a protest movement), but they have an untried new leader who might implode. The Greens are still small in the UK, but will partner with the Liberals to the benefit of both groups. The poor souls who departed the Tories or Labour on principle have no choice but to run as Liberals, unless they fancy trying their luck as independents. 

The fly in the ointment is Nigel Farage and his Brexit party. Farage today is the most powerful man in Britain, and he knows it. Trump and Putin know it too, and so does Boris. Maybe 25% of the electorate will follow his lead. If his party were to stand in open opposition to the Tories, the north would probably stay Labour and the south may turn Liberal. If he does a deal with Boris, both could become Conservative.

So I predict Boris will do a deal with him. Before I thought this would come before the election, but Boris has taken the risk of dealing with the EU first to create his simple platform and hand Farage his bargaining power. What will be the price? I shudder to think. It might involve criminal wealth, honours and titles, and further distancing over time from the EU. It will be mainly covert, and involve many foreigners. But I guess we can step back for a moment and admire Nigel Farage, who has somehow made himself the powerful Brit since Churchill.

Hence I predict a Tory landslide, but with plenty of uncertainty. Farage might become too greedy for even Boris to stomach, or may be vulnerable to a scandal. Boris might struggle to keep his party together, especially if Farage’s price is high, and Boris is a walking scandal who might score many own goals. Labour could surprise in either direction. I don’t see it (they are too dumb and arrogant), but they might even deal with the Liberals and Greens.

In this situation, if I were a betting man, I’d be scanning some outside bets, because this could just be the election to create extreme outcomes. I wonder what the odds are on the Tories winning 500 seats or Labour less than 50, or of Jo Swinson, or Phillip Hammond, or Ben Watson becoming prime minister. I can see paths for all these outcomes and think all are great bets at 100 to one.

One positive in all this will be a focus on individual politicians. If Labour is almost annihilated, the survivors will be good constituency MP’s in union cities. A few rebel independents may win. There will be great opportunities for talented young Liberals and Greens to emerge.

Despite all this, the two most likely outcomes are clear. We might get the nightmare of a repeat of the current parliament and current mess, and recycle the last two years as a result. Or we might get the other nightmare of Boris winning a landslide. The Irish will be sold down the river, the parasites will take over the city, the oligarchs will celebrate and the Scots will secede. Oh happy day.

But even then, we should not despair, because humanity will win out. Just as in the US, whether in 2020 or 2024 or even later, the pendulum will swing, and the longer the wait, the bigger the swing will be. In the UK, next time or the time after, the Greens might even win.