Keir Starmer’s Labour swept to a widely expected victory in the 2024 General Elections, ushering in a very red parliament not only in England but also Scotland. Labour won a landslide of 412 seats with one yet to be declared and that is a resounding win despite grouses about the first-past-the-post electoral system that often yields disproportionate results and the actual percentage of Labour’s vote share, so Starmer deserves praise for steering his party into power once again. Of course resounding wins with large parliamentary majorities can be squandered easily, as we saw with the Tories’ 2019 win which seemed at that time to herald a change of some magnitude with the smashing of the near mythical Red Wall. Starmer perhaps has more wisdom than we credit him for because he seems to realise the national mood is sombre and has promised his government would be “unburdened by doctrine”:
From now on, you have a government unburdened by doctrine, guided only by the determination to serve your interest, to defy, quietly, those who have written our country off. You have given us a clear mandate and we will use it to deliver change, to restore service and respect to politics, end the era of noisy performance, tread more lightly on your lives and unite our country.
Starmer has struck a very conciliatory note in his acceptance speech, vowing to rebuild the country and reset politics. He certainly has a daunting task ahead and he is likely to be less profligate with his political bounty than Boris Johnson, so we can and should wish him well. He has enough enemies within his own party.
The election saw a resurgence of Labour within Scotland, with the party winning 37 seats, an increase of 35 from the previous election. The Scottish National Party, the dominant party in Scotland since 2007, saw a spectacular collapse of support in which they lost 39 seats, bringing their total from 48 seats won at the previous election to 9. Scottish independence has been indefinitely postponed, sorry fellas.
The electorate’s main desire seemed to be to punish the Tories and they succeeded in that by diminishing the Tories to the lowest seat share ever in the history of the party. Tactical voting against the Tories also boosted the Lib-Dems to a parliamentary seat share they haven’t had since 1923. The Greens have also benefited with 4 seats. The big story is the revolt that has come from the right – the hastily formed Reform party won 5 seats but it is the percentage of the vote share that one must note. At 14%, the Reform party is ahead of the Lib-Dems’ 12% and that isn’t something to be dismissed for a couple of reasons : a populist right wing wave is sweeping through Europe which can only grow and there are signs, again in common with European trends, that a cohort of the young are very much a part of this resurgent right wing wave.
Another minority that seems to have made parliamentary inroads is the Islamist cohort, who won 4 seats including Islington North, Leicester South ( Shockat Adam), Dewsbury and Batley (Iqbal Mohammed ) and Blackburn (Adnan Hussain). Jonathan Ashworth who lost in Leicester was tearing into Suella Braverman last year for her criticism of Leicester’s problems and praising its multicultural strength. Labour MPs like Jess Phillips and Rushanara Ali faced thuggish behavior on the streets from muslims. Like Ashworth, Phillips who never wastes an opportunity to lecture others on their “Islamophobia” may have learned something in recent days.
Taj Ali who is the co-editor of Tribune Magazine (if you were wondering what ever happened to Seumas Milne, stop worrying, this is one of his boltholes) was simultaneously crowing about the pro-Hamas electoral victory and jealous that it was not getting enough serious attention like Reform.
There have been 4 pro-Gaza Independent candidates elected so far. The same number as Reform MPs. That's big and totally unexpected. It deserves coverage and analysis.
— Taj Ali (@Taj_Ali1) July 5, 2024
He doesnt seem to realise that Reform serves a majoritarian agenda and has scope to grow from 14% to much of the population while the Islamists may have maxed out on the Gaza outrage machine. But if he wants attention, the media should give it to him.
