Should Labour move left or right? It’s the wrong question, says Patrick English patrickenglish.substack.com/p/should-lab...
10.03.2026 07:50
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Should Labour move left or right? It’s the wrong question, says Patrick English patrickenglish.substack.com/p/should-lab...
Really interesting re Reform's benefits messaging that Reform tend to overperform in seats ranked higher for worklessness and Greens in seats with more in-work poverty. By @warringfictions.bsky.social
Thank you Pete
This analysis of UK voting patterns by studying different forms of deprivation is fascinating and provides an explanation for Labour's Green/Reform dilemma.
It's the work of Chris Clarke, doing the job of an entire think-tank here.
@warringfictions.bsky.social
open.substack.com/pub/parables...
Great piece Chris. In case it’s of interest this is my own recent analysis, with similar conclusions.
Here @chriscurtis94.bsky.social tells the sequence, thinking and analysis actually behind ‘hero voters’, inc. how my research @nuffieldcollege.bsky.social on economic insecurity w/ @rosedegeus.bsky.social informed understanding of the economic basis of electoral coalitions pre-2024.
Have been a bit frustrated by some of the conversation about Labour's voter coalition.
I've written about who the "Hero Voters" actually were, how we won them, and what we need to do to earn their support next time.
chriscurtismk.substack.com/p/who-actual...
Worth reading by @chriscurtis94.bsky.social. Abundantly clear to anyone that spends a cursory amount of time on public opinion that economic insecurity, exacerbated 10x by cost of living crisis is driving political force of our time, fuelling Labour’s woes chriscurtismk.substack.com/p/who-actual...
No sorry I meant the best predictor within IMD, which is the thing I was looking at in the piece. English vs British is a massive predictor too.
I think there is a vg case for the Alternative Vote (pluralist majoritarianism) UK's evolving party system - not least as of balanced use for voters on different sides of political spectrum. It allows sincere voting by every voter + strategic choices by those who care
www.ft.com/content/38d8...
NEW: After Gorton & Denton, how should we understand the threat to Labour's left?
Big new @persuasionuk.bsky.social report out with @38degrees.bsky.social on 'progressive defectors' - Lab 2024 switchers to Greens, Plaid, SNP, Lib Dems.
Who are they, who are they not & what's moving them? 🧵
Oh interesting thanks a lot. I haven’t read that but it looks great. I will give it a read. Thanks for commenting!
Thank you!
10/ Thanks a lot for reading. The full article is here: parables.substack.com/p/the-two-de...
May be of interest to @sundersays.bsky.social @benansell.bsky.social @emmaburnell.bsky.social @christabelcoops.bsky.social @anandmenon.bsky.social
9/ My conclusion in the piece is here, and it rooted in a move away from the politics of caricature – and towards a greater focus on regional inequality.
8/ Gorton and Denton was an unusual type of seat, in that it contained both ‘behind the glass’ and ‘balk of the queue’ type challenges. The by-election result – a simultaneous Green-Reform surge – reflected this.
7/ The central hypothesis is that growing regional inequality in the past 30 years has created ‘two deprivations’ These are set out in the table below. The former pull left, the latter pull right.
6/ The article also explores the interplay between income and employment deprivation, with significant regional differences. The biggest IMD predictor of whether an area is going green or turquoise is whether income or employment challenges are more acute.
5/ The next chart shows the same thing in a different way. This is the average ranking for each sub-domain, amongst the 100 seats of greatest strength for each party. Reform are appealing to a v particular sort of place – few opportunities but less housing challenges.
4/ The piece drills into the IMD’s 7 sub-domains. Differences are far more pronounced here. Places with employment/ education/ health deprivation have higher projected Reform votes. Places with housing/ income/ living environment deprivation are below average.
3/ However, so does the appeal of the Greens’, as this scatter shows…
(To confirm, higher dots reflect poorer areas, dots further to the right represent a higher Green vote).
2/ The piece asks which party is really appealing to poorer communities. The scatter below compares the @moreincommonuk.bsky.social January MRP with the 2025 Indices of Multiple Deprivation (IMD). Reform’s appeal correlates mildly with more deprived places.
1/ I have done a data dive on ‘The Two Deprivations’ and the govt’s Green-Reform dilemma: parables.substack.com/p/the-two-de...
It references the work of @luketryl.bsky.social @robfordmancs.bsky.social
It’s taboo to admit it, but voters bear some responsibility for the frayed state of Britain | Andy Beckett
Thoughtful and thought-provoking piece from @warringfictions.bsky.social on how a Labour government could achieve 'fiscal conservatism with economic radicalism'.
#UKPolitics
open.substack.com/pub/parables...
As we settle into a New Year I have done a deep dive into the psychology of debt, the metaphor of the household budget, and how this has come to affect social democratic politics in 2026:
parables.substack.com/p/understand...
As I pointed out last year: Bit weird the Mayor of London gets completely unmediated access to broadcast whatever message they like on BBC One at midnight!
(Even if in this case I agree with the message.)
takes.jamesomalley.co.uk/p/odds-and-e...
It's a pretty stark chart.
I also think @warringfictions.bsky.social has a good set of proposals on how to face the situation.
bsky.app/profile/warr...
Thank you Pete!
