Tribune. This time, the British polls, which gave the Conservative Party ten points ahead of Labor, were not mistaken and even underestimated the magnitude of this victory in terms of number of seats. Despite nine years in power and as many years of austerity policies, Boris Johnson's party has won 365 seats out of 650, including in the Labor Party-held constituencies of northern England and the Midlands. a half-century. This result is comparable to that of Margaret Thatcher in 1987 and, for Labor, with 203 seats, to their historic defeat in 1983. How to explain these figures and what lessons can be drawn from them on the state of British democracy?
It is clear, and commentators have immediately noticed, that these elections served as the second Brexit referendum. Conservatives drew the voices of many, many across the Channel, who wanted to end the never-ending saga of leaving the European Union (EU) and were drawn to the easy slogan "Get Brexit Done", including in the working class districts which traditionally voted Labor. Boris Johnson also benefited greatly from the boost from Nigel Farage, who removed his Brexit Party candidates from Conservative-held constituencies and attracted some anti-European Labor voters.
Elimination of small parties
Opposite, on the contrary, the pro-European voices were divided between the Liberal Democrats, whose campaign was also completely missed, Labor, who suffered from the ambiguous speech of their leader on the issue, and the nationalists in Scotland. However, the asymmetric nature of the realignment caused by Brexit must be stressed: while Labor voters who favor the Leave turned away from their traditional party, the conservative supporters of Remain remained loyal to their party.
On the other hand, as in 2017, young people (57% of 18-24 year olds) overwhelmingly chose the Labor Party and one wonders in what form their interest in politics will be able to be expressed in the future. All in all, if we look at the number of pro-EU and anti-EU votes, rather than the number of seats, we see that the British population remains almost 50/50 divided on the question of Brexit, contrary to what the Johnson's big win lets imagine.
Second, the first-past-the-post system continues to impress its relentless logic of eliminating small parties. The centrist (Liberal Democrat) party completely failed to break through despite circumstances which were a priori very favorable to it: on the one hand a Conservative Party drifting towards populist nationalism and, on the other, a very left Labor Party undermined by accusations of anti-Semitism. However, he did not exceed 12% of the vote and will struggle to be heard with only 11 seats in the House of Commons. It should also be noted that none of the centrist deputies who, in recent months, had left the Conservative Party (like Dominic Grieve, who presented himself as an independent) or the Labor Party (like Chuka Umunna, who joined the Liberal Democrats) managed to keep his seat.
