Are Centeral Parties Still Relevant in World Politics?
Updated: Feb 12
A look into the recent elections in the UK
The recently concluded elections in the UK had the Labour Party winning a thumping 400+ seat majority in the British parliament and the Tories (Conservative Party) decimated to their worst-ever performance since their founding 200 years back. In India, the ruling BJP faced a setback when it lost the majority in the Parliament and came crashing down to 240 from 303. In European Union Elections, the Rise of the right wing is evident with their growing strength in the Parliament, but still, the centre has somewhat held on to its ground. The elections in France also signal that even though the right wing under the National Rally had made gains, the centre was, is and will be a driving force in the French National Assembly for years to come.
We will focus on the election results in the United Kingdom.
Rumblings in the UK
After the 2019 general election results, when the Conservatives won a thumping majority under the leadership of then-Prime Minister Boris Johnson, it was said that the Labour Party was done for the next decade. Things were looking pretty gloomy for the Labour Party. This was their worst performance since they came into being and also a huge 10 per cent gap between the Labour and the Conservatives.
If you look at the graph above, you will see that voter movements were cyclical, but the sudden drop after the 2017 elections from 40% to 32.9%, was considered lethal for the party. The leader of the Labour, Jeremy Corbyn resigned after the abysmal showing and Labour was gripped with a leadership as well as an ideological crisis. Pundits argued that the Labour Party under the leadership of Jeremy Corbyn had gone too left on the political spectrum, also the Brexit referendum changed UK politics making the Labour 'unelectable' with the dispensation it had then. Then came the change in leadership and Sir Keir Starmer came into the helm of the Labour Party. He became the Leader of the Opposition in the House of Commons. He has a track record as a human rights attorney and a strong-willed public prosecutor. He vowed to make the Labour more electable and bring 'Change' in the party.
Conservatives in freefall
The 2019 elections hinted at some political stability as the conservatives had a full-on majority in the House of Commons. Things also looked good at the start of the 'Boris Era', the economy was doing fine, Brexit Deal was passed in the Commons, after failing several times in the past. Then stuck with the COVID-19 pandemic, the UK’s economy went into a free fall. The conservatives which were high on budget cuts and austerity measures were caught napping in the face of this big disaster. The National Health Service was burdened to such an extent that it still has waiting times that stretch up to 12 months. Also, many services were affected due to budget cuts during the Conservative era.
Then amid the Pandemic came the ‘Partygate’, It was revealed that Prime Minister Boris Johnson and his friends were partying in 10 Downing Street (Prime Ministerial Residence) while the whole country was in lockdown. This turned the public against Boris Johnson, leading to a full-blown investigation into the 'Partygate'.
Boris Johnson had to resign due to the extreme pressure from both outside and within the party. Then came the disastrous Liz Truss. She brought the infamous 'mini-budget', which crashed the economy, shot up commodity prices and took the UK to almost a recession. She had the most short-lived tenure as Prime Minister in UK's History, just 49 days. The Leadership crisis within the Conservatives developed, and a new name came out of this crisis, Rishi Sunak. Rishi Sunak became the first Prime Minister of the UK to be of South Asian descent and tried to steer the country out of a cost-of-living crisis and ongoing NHS strikes. To some extent, Sunak was able to control the economy's free fall and also was a little successful in reducing inflation but the public mood was set for change. The question was now, is the Labour Party the change they aspire to?
'Change' in Labour
In 2019, when the election results were coming, it was clear that Labour was heading for its worst defeat in over 7 decades. Jeremy Corbyn has been the leader of the Labour Party since 2015 and was till 2020, he led Labour to two consecutive defeats, one in 2017 and the other in 2019. Many accusations are that his role as the Labour Leader was taking the party to more left of centre than the party had ever gone. This can be seen in the General Elections results of 2019. Conservatives won an outright majority in the House of Commons, winning 365 seats out of the 650 there, whereas the Labour won 202 seats only, their lowest tally since the 1935 general elections in the UK. The defeat was so bad that many political pundits estimated this to be the end of the Labour Party as we know it. It was estimated that the Labour Party would take almost a decade to be electable again. Then came the leadership elections of 2020 and Sir Keir Starmer won these and became the Labour leader who brought the 'Change' in the party to make it electable again.
The Change, that Sir Keir Starmer brought was that he changed the whole policy platform on which the Labour was running. He shifted the Labour's stance on Immigration a lot which was a major election issue this election. He also had an image of being a tough guy on Law and order and public safety, an image that his predecessors used to struggle with. He Brought with him a platform similar to the 'New Labour' as done by Tony Blair in 1997. He brought the Labour to the Left of the Centre or even to the Centre on some issues, for example, the Labour Party took a strong Stance on Climate change, the National Health Service and the Railways revival. Starmer also advocated for a change in governance and ran on the platform of Decentralisation of adminsitration and governance.
A Labour Landslide
The Results of these elections were as shocking to Labour as it was for the Conservatives. Labour won more than 400 seats out of 650 in the House of Commons, The Conservatives crashed to their lowest tally in 2 centuries, just 121 seats. The extent of the downfall was this great that ex-Prime Minister, Liz Truss lost her seat along with many sitting ministers in the Rishi Sunak Government. Labour increased just a single point in its vote share from 2019, but the impact of Ed Devey's Liberal Democrats doing tactical voting and the 'X' factor in this election, Nigel Farage's Reform UK party was very much. The Reform was solely responsible for such a horrendous result for the Conservatives. The Liberal Democrats also performed very well winning 70 plus seats, whereas the Scottish National Party was one of the biggest losers of the night, it won only 10 seats which was a fall of 30 seats from the last time.
This was also considered one of the most consequential elections for the UK as it had the potential to define the country's future as we approach the 2030s and enter the middle of the twenty-first century. The results are indicative of the fact that Central approaches to politics have still relevance in the Politics of the UK, although a cautionary note must be given that Ultra Right and Ultra Left both have strong showings in the UK Political arena. Also, the conventional Political parties of the UK, The Conservatives and the Labour won only 57.8% of the vote, which is the lowest since the 1918 General Elections. The trust of the people in these conventional political parties has been reduced but not finished. There is still a hope of revival of hope in the UK as the new government tries to bring stability to a socially, economically and politically divided United Kingdom.
