Elections are like high school drama. You kind of hate them,
but you also secretly adore them. Though I’ve got to say, this election might
be the first I’ve found genuinely exhausting. I suppose maybe it’s because I’m
getting old, or maybe it’s because it’s a nice day up North (that’s not a political
nod to anything) and as I watch the coverage – eyes glued to the screen,
obviously – the Sun is dehydrating me. Like the election, there’s a lot of
things to consider.
Or maybe I should say blame. Who does Theresa May blame for
what is most certainly a huge loss, but at the same time is technically a win?
Who does Jeremy Corbyn blame for Labour’s indisputable loss that has the smell
of victory about it? Who do the electorate blame for telling them there’d be a
landslide victory, and (not so subtly) who do the TV pundits blame for giving
them terrible polling results?
This is a weird election. I believe all elections can be
weird, if you drill down into the demographic data enough, but this is weird
because you don’t need to do that too much.
Let’s look at turnout, which was at its highest point since
19971 and particularly high amongst young people2 (there
is a figure of 72% doing the rounds, but as the BBC points out, there’s no
reliable data yet). Lord Ashcroft published an article on June the 6th
noting that the number of Tory seats falls as the voter turnout rises.3
It’s worth pointing out that Ashcroft’s model predicted a Tory majority, even
under high turnout scenarios – “The
higher turnout scenarios, meanwhile, estimate a lower range of majorities,”
so maybe Ashcroft isn’t the best go to guy to talk about turnout data.
The point is this – if the Tories knew that a high turnout
would go against them, then, just from data alone, we must place some blame for
the result at the door with all those people that chose to, well, step out of
their doors and vote.
One thing that was in Mrs. May’s pocket, one thing she could
rely on to win, was Brexit, no? Even I wrote on the 31st of May, “If tonight's debate is about Brexit, Theresa
May will win even in absentia.” Certainly, early in the night some
commentators were finding comfort in the fact that Leave seats were seeing a smaller swing compared to what the Exit
Poll would suggest, but one must ask the question: if the British public
believed in a Conservative Brexit,
indeed, if they believed in Brexit at all, why didn’t Mrs. May win a majority?
Some will bark that the referendum result shows the British
public clearly care about Brexit, and others will argue that the collapse in
the UKIP vote4 (from 13% in 2015 to 2% today) shows that Brexit was
a trump card for the Tories. But that’s a reductionist view of UKIPers (I find
that statement oddly ironic). In my mind, there’s three reasons for the
collapse in UKIP. The first is the Hard Brexiteers have defected to the Tories,
accounting for some fall in UKIP and some rise in the Tories. The second is
that the (potential) rise in the 18-24-year-old vote essentially diluted the
UKIP vote, and what we’re seeing isn’t necessarily movement (on this, I very
well could be wrong. I’ve not been able to compare the raw number of votes to
confirm this idea). The third is that many of those who voted for UKIP don’t
care about Brexit.
This sounds dumb. UKIP, almost undeniably, were a one issue
party, which was Brexit. Yet, as many in the media seem to forget, UKIP for the
longest time were a protest vote too. And Brexit, in my opinion, was more of a
vote against the establishment order than anything to do with the EU. So, when
Theresa May runs on Brexit (and UKIP run on enforcing the integrity of Brexit),
many UKIP voters just don’t care. She’s establishment, and some would argue,
responsible for many economic issues facing the lives of that group. And
Corbyn, the leader of the (still) second largest party, markets himself as outside
the establishment, and importantly, as anti-austerity.
If Brexit isn’t as big an issue as the media and the Tories
think, and austerity is the real creature that they must slay, then the picture
quickly emerges of why the result was what it was.
But what of the media? They told us this election would be
dull. There were murmurs of low election turnout;5 Brenda
articulated in the most adorable when the sense of fatigue the whole country
felt. And yet on the night (and throughout the election, let’s be honest) it
wasn’t boring. In fact, little of what the pundits said turned out to be true,
except for of course the Exit Poll, which many, “[couldn’t] believe.”
In fact, many of the pundits seemed so sure that no one saw
that result coming. Except… YouGov6 and Survation7 saw it
coming about a week ago. Now, to the credit of at least the BBC, they
acknowledged that those two polls were bang on the money, and that they, with
their commentary, had missed a trick. What was that trick? Well, both YouGov
and Survation factored in a higher number of young voters than other polls.8
There’s that old stick-in-the-mud again.
I’m not going to say much about the Tabloids that, on both
sides of the argument, were far too dispelling in their coverage. Nor am I
going to linger on the problems the mainstream media had covering this
election, in terms of being correct or being complacent. I can be accused
(rightly) of both myself. And of course, the Exit Poll, YouGov and Survation
were (to varying degrees) off in their predictions. But the media must realise
that they’re losing creditability, and that’s bad for all of us. Did they play
a factor in the election, perhaps as a whispering sound in Theresa May’s ear as
she was walking on holiday?9 I think someone should be asking what
role the media will play in the future.
And that’s about it. Well, it’s not. Theresa May was a
disastrous candidate with a horrible manifesto, whereas Jeremy Corbyn was (by
most reporting) a disastrous candidate with a popular manifesto; the Dementia
Tax swung the polls more than Labour ever actually did;10 nationalism
remained a prominent force, whilst whispers across the channel played their
role too; “Strong and Stable,” repeat
ad infinitum. I don’t see the point of talking about these things, because I
don’t need to. Switch on your TV and absorb the analysis, with a free side of
cross-analysis thrown in.
I’m trying to get to a point, and I think it’s this.
Firstly, the youth vote (probably) swung this election massively, which is good
for democracy, bad for functioning government, and a much more significant
trend than it is currently being given credit for. Secondly, Brexit wasn’t the
issue it was meant to be. That’s not to say it didn’t matter, but Brexit is
derivative of austerity policy, and is not in itself the cause of political
turmoil. Austerity (amongst other policies, such as Social Care) drove this
election result; if anything, Brexit is this election’s cousin, not it’s
father. And thirdly, the media got predictions very wrong throughout the campaign.
Some will say the media was horribly biased; all I’ll say is it felt
frustrating at times, and caveats exist for a reason – use them!
Anyway, I’ll see you in Autumn… (maybe)
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