-
AAPL
213.43 (+0.29%)
-
BARC-LN
1205.7 (-1.46%)
-
NKE
94.05 (+0.39%)
-
CVX
152.67 (-1.00%)
-
CRM
230.27 (-2.34%)
-
INTC
30.5 (-0.87%)
-
DIS
100.16 (-0.67%)
-
DOW
55.79 (-0.82%)
Watch: Liz Truss loses her seat
It’s the Portillo moment of 2024. Liz Truss sensationally lost her safe South West Norfolk seat this morning, less than two years after serving as prime minister. Amid much online excitement about her prospects of losing, Truss was initially not seen at the count at 6 a.m, forcing the result to be delayed by several minutes. Some of those watching began slow clapping before she appeared, not wearing a Conservative rosette.
There were gasps and cheers as the results were read out, as Truss became the biggest Tory casualty on a painful night for the party. Labour’s Terry Jermy won by more than 600 votes in a seat that previously had a Conservative majority of 26,195, making it the 13th safest Tory seat nationally. Jermy took 11,847 votes while Truss won just 11,217, turning a constituency that had been blue since 1964 red for the first time in 60 years. Ouch.
You can watch the moment below:
Looking to the past won’t help the Tories navigate their future
These are going to be dark days of introspection for Conservatives. And, as they try to make sense of the 2024 election, some will look to the party’s past to put it into historical perspective. There is, however, no precedent for how awful the result was for the party in terms of vote share and seats won: it really was that bad.
Yet, as a comfort amongst the wreckage, but also an inspiration for future effort, some party members will likely alight upon earlier examples of how the Conservatives recovered from cataclysmic defeat. Of those modern instances – 1906, 1945 and 1997 – 1945 is by far the most appealing. After being thumped by the Liberals in 1906, the Tories needed the first world war to get back into government as part of a coalition; after Tony Blair took them to the cleaners in 1997, an international financial crash was required to help them win office again and then only in another coalition. But after 1945, the Conservatives bounced back almost immediately, through their own efforts and to great effect.
Moments such as this are especially disconcerting for Conservatives
In July 1945, Britons unexpectedly gave Winston Churchill a bloody nose, despite his warning that Clement Attlee would need ‘some form of Gestapo’ to implement Labour’s manifesto. Instead, voters rewarded Labour with its first ever Commons majority – and one of 145 seats at that. Commentators speculated that Attlee’s party would be in office for a generation. Such was the scale of defeat, Harold MacMillan called for Conservatives to change their party name and merge with the Liberals.
Yet by the February 1950 election, Conservatives had reduced Attlee’s majority to just five. When the prime minister sought to improve this position in October 1951, it was the Conservatives who triumphed, winning a majority of 17. The party would increase that majority in two subsequent elections and remain in office until 1964.
But if they go misty eyed at what happened seven decades ago, Conservatives should remember that the past is another country: they do politics differently there. Most obviously the party’s position is more complicated today than it was then. After 1945, Conservatives only had to move in one direction to improve their electoral position: to the left. And the leadership did that with alacrity, accepting most of Labour’s 1945 programme while insisting they were doing no such thing.
In 2024, however, the party has seen its vote fracture in various directions. Not only must Conservatives now appeal to those who abandoned them for Labour and the Liberal Democrats – but also for Reform. Nigel Farage’s intervention has massively complicated its path to recovery. Now, the party must determine which direction it should travel in during this parliament: left or right or both at the same time?
The Conservatives’ move left after 1945 was moreover imposed from the top on a sceptical but disempowered and deferential membership. Led by Rab Butler, who chaired the Conservative Research Department, policy was revised to become, in essence, a watered-down version of Labour’s statist reforms.
Despite ideological misgivings, the party grudgingly accepted this as the price of returning to office. Ideas mattered but not as much as exercising power. So, when Churchill was given a draft speech by a callow Research Department official embracing most of Labour’s nationalisation programme he told him: ‘I don’t believe a word of it’. Even so, the leader obediently read it out to conference delegates’ loyal applause.
In contrast, today leading Conservatives – most obviously Suella Braverman – refer to their party possessing a ‘soul’, a precious entity that has somehow been lost and needs to be rediscovered. To them, ideas – pure Conservative ideas, notably those of the small state and low taxation, are now themselves central to winning back power. And many party members, who ultimately determine the outcome of any leadership contest thanks to William Hague’s 1998 reforms – agree. The scope for a pragmatic leadership emulating Butler’s middle-of-the-road course back to power looks decidedly slim.
After 1945, Conservatives enthusiastically exploited Attlee’s problems as Labour tried to turn a wartime economy into an export-focused peacetime operation amidst a world in turmoil. Rationing, shortages and queues for essential goods became worse while nationalisation did not prove the panacea some hoped. The widespread frustration that things were not getting better allowed the party to appeal especially to middle-class voters who had supported Labour for the first time in 1945.
Conservatives will hope to do the same in this parliament as Prime Minister Starmer tries to encourage the kind of economic growth that has eluded most recent governments to finance promised improvements in the public services. But it is unlikely that critiquing Labour will be enough on its own if the Conservatives are to fully regain the initiative.
In contrast to Labour – which has suffered defeat so consistently and dramatically that it had almost become an old friend – moments such as this are especially disconcerting for Conservatives. So far, they have always recovered. But just because they have bounced back in the past does not mean they always will. Certainly, for the foreseeable future, the route back suggested by 1945 – adapt many of your opponent’s policies as the price worth paying for power – no longer seems open to a party forced to look left and right at the same time while its members argue over the precise character of Conservatism’s ideological ‘soul’. They could be in opposition for a very long time indeed.
Will the Tories finally get the message?
Can it just be a coincidence that most of the leading figures of the Tory left lost their seats, while the coming women and men of the right largely held on? Kemi Badenoch, Robert Jenrick and Suella Braverman all made it back to the Commons while whole phalanxes of would-be leadership contenders from the ‘One Nation’ wing of the party fell by the wayside. Penny Mordaunt, Grant Shapps, Alex Chalk and Gillian Keegan were among the biggest casualties.
The coming civil war for the soul of the Tories is shaping up to be a humdinger
Perhaps having anti-woke and mass-migration sceptic credentials helped those on the right minimise the Reform vote in their patches and thus avoid a bloodbath that Nigel Farage had far more to do with than Keir Starmer did.
For it was Farage’s dynamic revolt on the right, rather than Starmer’s underwhelming Labour trickle forward, in terms of vote share, that changed the electoral arithmetic in so many seats.
Robert Buckland set the tone for bitter outpourings from centrist Tories when he launched into a self-congratulatory concession speech that implied he and his ilk were too good for the rough old trade of right-wing politics. He clearly had Braverman chiefly in mind when attacking the indiscipline of colleagues. Yet she won her seat – and he lost his.
If there was no stand-out ‘Portillo’ moment of this election that was largely because the television coverage was so poor, with numerous declarations missed or abandoned owing to issues with sound quality or over-running studio waffle-fests. Mordaunt was very gracious in defeat, though one was tempted to whistle at the chunky dimensions of the Reform vote that doomed her.
So the leadership contest that will shortly get under way will have to do so without the great south coast sword carrier. Tom Tugendhat looks the most likely champion of the left and will no doubt seek a right-wing ‘running mate’ to make himself more palatable to the Tory grassroots.
Badenoch got home with a majority of well under 3,000 in North West Essex. She was perhaps saved by her would-be nemesis, David Tennant, when he demanded that she should cease to exist on account of her trans views and hence reminded many voters why she was worth supporting. Now, unburdened from the shackles of being a minister in Rishi Sunak’s cabinet, she has the chance to show she has the ideas and the mettle to be the saviour of the Tories.
It is difficult to fathom how it cannot be obvious to every Conservative that it was failing to compete with Farage and his allies for the votes of right-wing people that cost them dearly. And yet the old drumbeat about needing to tack back to the fabled centre-ground has struck up again as allies and protégés of George Osborne fan out across the airwaves.
The coming civil war for the soul of the Tories is shaping up to be a humdinger. But perhaps momentum now lies with the right, due to the simple fact that so many on the left failed to get themselves re-elected.
Why Jews returned to Labour
Two weeks before the general election, the Jewish Chronicle commissioned a Survation poll to map the voting intentions of British Jews. To our surprise, we found that, unlike the rest of the country, the Tories were just ahead in the community – by nine percentage points. The stain of the Corbyn years, it seemed, had not yet been fully erased.
The following week, however, a second, larger poll was published. This one, by Jewish Policy Research, put Labour 16 points ahead.
It was against this background of ambiguity that amid high drama overnight, the Jewish heartland seat of Finchley fell to Labour’s Sarah Sackman, who defeated the Conservative candidate, Alex Deane, by 4,581 votes. The result was particularly poignant given the fact that the seat had previously been held by Mike Freer, who had stood up for the Jews and Israel for 14 years before a shameful act of arson made it all too much. A fighter to the end, he was pictured canvassing for Deane on the very last day of the campaign.
As the late Rabbi Lionel Blue said: ‘Jews are like everybody else but more so.’ This is especially true in politics, where radical movements that are subversive to western values inevitably come for the Jews first.
A question that has been foremost in the minds of many British voters over the past six weeks has been whether Labour – and Sir Keir Starmer – have changed. Just five years ago, it was a party of cranks, extremists, bigots and anti-Semites. Just five years ago, Sir Keir appeared to do his utmost to put their hempy chieftain in No. 10. Could the country trust him and his party now?
For Jews, this question cut particularly deep. As the campaign developed and Sir Keir was questioned repeatedly about his former support for Corbyn, his answers left many bewildered.
First, he explained it by saying that he always knew Corbyn would lose. This created more questions than it answered, as it suggested that this was a man who was perfectly capable of supporting a loser, under the pretence of holding values that he did not hold, over a period of several years. Hardly a chap you might entrust with the keys to Downing Street. What would he have done had Corbyn won?
The Labour leader then changed tack, claiming that he had experienced a Damascene conversion to the cause of putting the country before the party. Once again, this created new queries. Was he really telling us that his entire political career until 2019 had been spent wrapped in a self-serving, partisan delusion? If so, how was it possible to flip the switch on such a deeply ingrained flaw?
Moreover, if he was able to change his ideological clothes with such ease, how could we be sure that the new, centrist Labour party was anything more than a ploy to win power, a Trojan horse for his older, more radical beliefs?
Concerns such as these were the subject of many a Friday night dinner conversation in the Jewish community, as well as in the British mainstream. The years since 2015 have been painful for the Jews, particularly those on the left, who suffered the ignominy of having their political home reject them in the most vicious of ways.
After Corbyn’s defenestration, Jewish progressives felt a powerful desire to take Sir Keir at his word and return to the fold. But something held many of them back. To wish for Labour to have changed was all very well, but to allow that to cloud one’s judgment could lead to even greater ruination.
This uncertainty was evident as recently as two weeks ago, when despite a huge swing of 50 points to Labour, enough members of the community remained unconvinced enough to deprive Sir Keir of a majority in our polling. A week later, however, the matter seemed settled. Labour was kosher again.
Partly, this was due to the determined efforts of Sir Keir himself in ‘rooting out’ anti-Semitism from the party. Partly it was due to the way in which he steered Labour carefully but insistently back towards the centre; when parties veer to the radical fringes, it is never good for the Jews.
But it was also due to the Labour rank-and-file, who matched Sir Keir’s efforts with more quotidian goodwill gestures of their own. Sackman, a barrister specialising in environment-related cases who has been vice-chair of the Jewish Labour Movement for more than eight years, was an excellent choice of candidate for Finchley. She and her team worked hard to rebuild bridges. Last night, their efforts were rewarded.
The cumulative effect of a party’s culture can be a powerful thing, for bad as well as for good. God knows we have seen both from Labour over the last decade.
It would be a mistake to suggest that all the difficult questions about Sir Keir’s support for Corbyn have been adequately addressed
As the sun rises over a Labour Britain, I think of Dame Louise Ellman, the veteran MP for Liverpool Riverside, who was viciously hounded out of the party during the Corbyn years. I discussed the matter with her at some length a couple of months ago. At one point, she told me, local party members launched a project to ‘dehumanise’ her. Nobody used her name, referring to her instead as ‘the MP’. Nobody made eye contact with her. Whenever she entered a room, people walked out.
This was all because of her very reasonable lack of antipathy for Israel, her ancestral homeland. When brought to life with anecdotes like this, such blatant anti-Semitism makes the skin crawl. Dame Louise had more reason than anyone to stay away from Labour for the rest of her life; but in 2021, she rejoined it. ‘I am confident that, under the leadership of Keir Starmer, the party is once again led by a man of principle in whom the British people and Britain’s Jews can have trust’, she said at the time.
She wasn’t the only one. Last year, Luciana Berger – who had also suffered torrents of abuse at the hands of Corbynistas – also returned. If these brave women could show forgiveness and confidence in the new regime, the stage was set for other left-wing Jews to follow suit.
It would be a mistake to suggest that all the difficult questions about Sir Keir’s support for Corbyn have been adequately addressed. In politics, some things will never be fully understood. It is certain, however, that the majority of British Jews, particularly those inclined to the left, believe in Labour again. They have Sir Keir to thank for that.
The SNP’s catastrophic defeat is an opportunity for Scotland
Like the wider UK result, the SNP getting a hammering in yesterday’s general election was largely predicted by the polls. But this has not lessened the impact of seeing the many well-kent faces of high-profile former SNP MPs being given their marching orders by the Scottish electorate. One after another they fell, and with them the hubris that has defined the party since 2014 melted away.
Popularity in democracies tends to be cyclical, but the SNP has defined itself not as a mere political party but as the beating heart of a national liberation movement and, as such, able to transcend political gravity. It also has a particular emotional pull for many of its members, many of whom have an unfortunate tendency to conflate party and nation. For them, yesterday’s seat losses must have come as a body blow.
The SNP should be humble in response to the strength of the signal the Scottish electorate has sent them
For Scotland, it is a different story. This is an opportunity for a reset. This morning’s result leads to obvious practical consequences for the SNP. It loses its position as the third party at Westminster, and with it a large amount of short money as well as talent. That dramatically reins in its ability to campaign for independence. If John Swinney, or his successor, has the gall to demand a second referendum from the new UK government on the spurious grounds his administration has a ‘mandate’ from the 2021 Holyrood election, then Keir Starmer need not take it seriously for the simple reason the people of Scotland will not take it seriously.
More importantly, perhaps, is the chance to end the poisonous national identity culture war the SNP has inflicted on Scotland these past ten years. Most Scots will have a sense of this. The SNP has worked hard to split Scots into two distinct cultural tribes: nationalist (which equates with being Scottish, noble and good) and unionist (which equates with being British and therefore unsavoury and bad).
To catalyse this national identity culture war, the symbols and cultural touchstones of Scottish identity were appropriated for the cause. The message was that if you truly wish to identify as Scottish then you must embrace the SNP’s nationalism. As with all culture wars, the aim was to frame those on the other side as culturally toxic, such that no right-minded person would want to be part of their group. Over time, in-group versus out-group psychology would ultimately ensure victory for the culturally dominant side.
The SNP has continuously stoked this national identity culture war to maintain its support. This goes some way to explaining why their dominance of Scottish politics has been so toxic. With that dominance now on the wane, Scotland has a chance to reclaim national identity as a secular phenomenon; to stop it being politicised and indeed weaponised for party-political gain.
The new Labour administration in London will obviously have a pivotal role to play in progressing Scotland’s political culture beyond the toxicity of the past decade. At a basic level, improving prosperity in Scotland will help lock in the trend of falling SNP support. Less obviously, the Labour government will have to ensure that Scotland’s national identity culture war is no longer a driver of its politics.
In the past, Labour has been guilty of stoking nationalism in Scotland because it served its immediate electoral needs. It framed Conservatism as a foreign presence in a fundamentally non-Conservative country, and in doing so established myths of national exceptionalism that the SNP later turbo-charged to its advantage. The Labour government of the 2020s needs to be smarter than that.
Its approach to the constitutional question should be pragmatic and utilitarian. It needs to reinforce the Scottish electorate’s move back to the left-right spectrum, with abstract ideals about sovereignty and identity relegated to lesser issues. If national identity comes into the equation at all then it should be in terms of celebrating our multiple, overlapping identities, where there is no contradiction between being Scottish and British.
The Labour party has some smart new Scottish MPs who understand the importance of framing and not falling into nationalist traps. They should be listened to.
As for the SNP, they should, for once, be humble in response to the strength of the signal the Scottish electorate has sent them. They have had every opportunity since the independence referendum to move the dial in support of secession – but have failed to do so. They never accepted the will of the Scottish people in 2014. They must do so now. And in doing so they might also diminish the pernicious national identity culture war they created, to the detriment of Scotland.
The Tory blame game begins
As Labour declares victory in the general election, Rishi Sunak is on course to preside over the Tories’ worst ever general election result. As the results pour in, the Conservative losses are piling up with Defence Secretary Grant Shapps, Education Secretary Gillian Keegan and Chief Whip Simon Hart among the senior members of Sunak’s team to lose their seat. Sunak and Jeremy Hunt may have clung on but the Tory party is losing all over the place – from the north-east and Wales to Surrey and Oxfordshire.
The recriminations are well under way
On current results, it looks as though Labour has won around 36 per cent of the vote but will have a majority of around 170. Meanwhile, the Tories have won around 22 per cent of the vote – with Reform not far behind on 17 per cent. It’s clear from the results so far that the Reform party has had a devastating effect on the Tories. So far, there are four Reform MPs – but in many more seats the Reform vote share appears to have been the factor that meant some Tory candidates, such as Jacob Rees-Mogg, lost their seats to Labour.
There was initially some relief for the Tories when the exit poll came through. Not because it was a good result – but because some MRP polls had suggested the Tories could be reduced to a fringe party in double digits. There was talk that the Liberal Democrats could be the second-largest party and the BBC could soon deprive the Tories of coverage on account of the party’s low vote share. This nightmare scenario has been avoided – but the reality isn’t that much better.
As the results have come in, it has been a sobering experience for Tory politicians. Some candidates describe themselves as feeling numb over the result. Others are simply angry they were put in this position – made to fight an election they thought was a bad idea. It’s not just the ‘big names’ who have lost their seats, it’s the losses in areas that have been Conservative for 100 years, such as Chichester. Then there’s Reform gains in former Tory strongholds such as Great Yarmouth. It means the recriminations are well under way.
Former cabinet minister Brandon Lewis has hit out at Sunak’s decision to go for a July election – a decision he described as madness when many candidates had not been selected and the CCHQ machine was not ready. Former Scottish Conservative leader Ruth Davidson has blamed Sunak’s D-Day debacle for the party losing in some marginals. Robert Buckland – who lost his seat to Labour – laid the blame at the feet of colleagues such as Suella Braverman and ‘performance art politics’: ‘I’ve watched colleagues in the Conservative party strike poses, write inflammatory op-eds and say stupid things they know have no evidence for instead of getting on with the job.’
Expect more of this as the day goes on. Sunak has said he will take the blame – but at this rate there is plenty of vitriol to go around.
Full list: Rees-Mogg and Mordaunt among big beasts felled in Tory wipeout
They’ve been some of the most dominant figures in British politics of the past five years – but now they’re out of the Commons. Former prime minister Lis Truss has lost her seat. And among the other high-profile casualties are the Defence Secretary Grant Shapps and Penny Mordaunt, the Leader of the House of Commons. Lord Chancellor Alex Chalk, Education Secretary Gillian Keegan and Michelle Donelan, the Science Secretary, have also been given the boot.
Below is a list of all the ministers who have lost their seats thus far:
- Penny Mordaunt, Leader of the House
- Simon Hart, Chief Whip
- Johnny Mercer, Veterans’ minister
- Grant Shapps, Defence Secretary
- Gillian Keegan, Education Secretary
- Alex Chalk, Justice Secretary
- Lucy Frazer, Culture Secretary
- Michelle Donelan, Science Secretary
- David TC Davies, Welsh Secretary
- Victoria Prentis, Attorney General
- Mark Harper, Transport Secretary
We will govern as a changed Labour party
Keir Starmer has given a speech in Central London early this morning after winning the 2024 general election. Below is a full transcript of his remarks:
We did it. You campaigned for it, you fought for it, you voted for it, and now it has arrived. Change begins now.
And it feels good, I have to be honest. Four and a half years of work, changing the party. This is what it is for. A changed Labour party, ready to serve our country, ready to restore Britain to the service of working people.
And across our country, people will be waking up to the news, relieved that a weight has been lifted, a burden finally removed from the shoulders of this great nation. And now we can look forward again. Walk into the morning, the sunlight of hope – pale at first, but getting stronger through the day, shining once again on a country with the opportunity after 14 years to get its future back.
And I want to thank each and every one of you here for campaigning so hard for change. And not just in this campaign either. Also for these four and a half years, changing our party. The Labour movement is always, everything’s achieved past and future, down to the efforts of its people. So thank you truly: you have changed our country.
But a mandate like this comes with a great responsibility. Our task is nothing less than renewing the ideas that hold this country together. National renewal. Whoever you are, wherever you started in life, if you worked hard and play by the rules, this country should give you a fair chance to get on. It should always respect your contribution, and we have to restore that.
And alongside that, we have to return politics to public service. Show that politics can be a force for good. Make no mistake, that is the great test of politics in this era. The fight for trust is the battle that defines us our age. It is why we’ve campaigned so hard on demonstrating we are fit for public service. Service is the precondition for hope. Respect: the bond that can unite the country. Together, the values of this changed Labour party are the guiding principle for a new government. Country first, party second.
That is the responsibility of this mandate. You know, 14 years ago we were told that we were all in it together. I say to the British people today, imagine what we can do if that were actually true. So, by all means enjoy this moment. Nobody can save you haven’t waited patiently. Enjoy the feeling of waking up on a morning like this, the emotion, that you do see the country through the same eyes. Hold onto it, because it is what unity is made from. But use it to show to the rest of the country, as we must, that this party has changed, that we will serve them faithfully, govern for every single person in this country.
But also, don’t forget how we got here. This morning, we can see that the British people have voted to turn the page on 14 years. But don’t pretend that there was anything inevitable about that. There’s nothing preordained in politics. Election victories don’t fall from the sky. They’re hard won and hard fought for, and this one could only be won by a changed Labour party.
We have the chance to change our public services because we changed the party. We have the chance to make work pay because we changed the party. We have the chance to deliver for working people, young people, vulnerable people, the poorest in our society, because we changed the party.
Changing a country isn’t like flicking a switch
Country first, party second isn’t a slogan. It’s the guiding principle everything we have done and must keep on doing: on the economy, on national security, on protecting our borders. The British people have to look us in the eye and see that we can serve their interests. And that work doesn’t stop now. It never stops. The changes we’ve made are permanent, irreversible, and we must keep going. We ran as a changed Labour party, and we will govern as a changed Labour party.
I don’t promise you it will be easy. Changing a country isn’t like flicking a switch. It’s hard work: patient work, determined work. And we will have to get moving immediately. But even when the going gets tough – and it will – remember, tonight and always, what this is all about.
Now I may have mentioned my parents a few times in this campaign, once or twice. But the sense of security we had, the comfort they took from believing that Britain would always be better for their children. The hope – not high-minded, not idealistic – but a hope that working-class families like mine could build their lives around. It is hope that may not burn brightly in Britain at the moment, but we have earned the mandate to relight the fire. That is the purpose of this party and of this government. We said we would end the chaos, and we will. We said we would turn the page and we have. Today we start the next chapter, begin the work of change, the mission of national renewal, and start to rebuild our country. Thank you.
The ugliness of tattoos
Rishi Sunak devoted part of the last day of his doomed premiership to meeting Becky Holt, Britain’s most tattooed mother, on ITV’s This Morning show. Ms Holt was clad in a bikini which revealed much of the 95 per cent of her body surface that is covered in tattoos. After the brief encounter, she told OK magazine that the PM had been ‘really, really polite’ and had merely inquired how much her tattoos had cost.
I once had a close encounter with a woman who had her last lover’s birth sign tattooed in a very intimate spot
During the 20th century and earlier, British tattoos were largely confined to sailors who had acquired them in foreign ports. A discreet anchor or mermaid etched on to a matelot’s beefy forearm were about the only examples of the tattooists’ art to be seen on our streets. My father claimed that a well-known admiral had the tattoo of an entire fox hunt – hounds, horses and all – galloping majestically across his back and nether regions. Be that as it may, it is undoubtedly true that tattoos were an exotic and rarely seen addition to the rich tapestry of life in these islands, associated with Britain’s history as a leading maritime power. But then, as the 21st century dawned, that all changed.
Perforating the skin with pigments for decorative or other purposes is a very ancient art: the oldest known example of a tattooed person, the man known as Otzi, whose perfectly preserved body was found high in the Alps on the Austrian-Italian border in 1991, lived some 3,330 years ago in Neolithic times. Tattooing reached its zenith among the Pacific cultures of Polynesia, where the people used tattoos for military and religious purposes, as well as in marital rituals, and the tattoo achieved astonishing levels of elaborate beauty. In Europe, the practice acquired a rather more sinister reputation when the Nazi SS used tattoos to number their victims in the death camps of the Holocaust, and tattooed their own recruits with their blood groups.
I encountered tattoos up close and personal in 2016 when I took what was billed as an erotic holiday at an isolated villa camp in the mountains of Andalusia, where enforced nudity was the order of the day. The camp was run by a German couple, and the lady of the house had a rather lovely pattern of roses tattooed across her voluminous breasts in vibrant red and green colours that must have been painful to acquire. By then, mass tattooing had taken off in Britain in a big way. Tattoo parlours had opened in every town and city, and their satisfied customers were proudly parading the results, which are especially noticeable in summer, when tattoos on arms and legs can be seen sprouting everywhere.
This being Britain, the fashion for tattoos soon took on dimensions of class, and while modish middle-class ladies contented themselves with a discreet ankle tattoo, working class heroes like David Beckham went public with every available inch of their body surface decorated with the tattooists’ art. Tattoos appeared in the most surprising places. I once had a close encounter with a woman who had her last lover’s birth sign tattooed in a very intimate spot. Such displays of fidelity can have embarrassing results: what happens when you have DAVE or DAWN prominently tattooed, and then your relationship with them founders?
Tattoos tend not to age well. As the years go by, skins wrinkle, tastes change, and even the boldest tattoos begin to blur and fade. Those who use their flesh as message boards can be left stranded in time. Apart from the more obvious dangers of dirty needles leading to infections or blood poisoning, tattoos are often offensive on purely aesthetic grounds. Brits have never been known as a particularly visually aware or adept people, but the sheer uglification of public spaces by tattoos is reaching intolerable levels. Those who prowl the streets with hideous inky splodges crawling up their thick necks are not a pretty sight. These are not the picturesquely decorated heroes of Moby Dick or jolly Jack Tars with tales of Tangiers and Trafalgar: they are making a visual statement of their own crass stupidity. Modern mass tattoos do have one useful purpose, however: they silently tell us that the wearer is a moron without putting us to the trouble of speaking to them to verify that fact.
What happened to the erotic film?
Sexy time at the cinema is becoming a thing of the past. That’s according to research on the prevalence of vices in top live-action films from film maven Stephen Follows. His study shows that drug taking and violence are as popular on screen as ever in the 21st century. Profanity has dipped only slightly, but sex has dropped off a cliff since the year 2000.
We used to love what they used to call a steamy blockbuster. I came of age in an era where the ‘erotic thriller’ – 9½ Weeks, Fatal Attraction, Basic Instinct – were the box office draws, in which big stars lost their drawers. Comedies like A Fish Called Wanda, Green Card or When Harry Met Sally relied on frisson and fizz for a large part of their appeal. Adult relationships – whether cutely romantic or dangerously obsessive – got bums on seats.
No more. The big cinema hits are superhero, horror, sci-fi and fantasy, and not at the grown-up end of those genres. As with so much of this century’s mass culture everything feels arrested in very early adolescence, the fraught kidult time when you may well be thinking about sex and worrying about sex, but not actually having sex. This is cinema on puberty blockers.
We now have the deeply unsexy phenomena of ‘sex positivity’ and ‘body positivity’
The expanding Chinese market, with its stricter rules and very different social attitudes towards sex, is an obvious factor here. CCP-appointed censors are just not going to pass such western capitalist decadence. And then, of course, there is porn, and the problem for Hollywood of ‘How you gonna keep them down on the farm now that they’ve seen Paree?’ When pretty much any sexual display can be accessed in a couple of clicks, the suggestion and tantalising teasing of the erotic loses its intrigue.
I’m afraid that the prudes of old were right about mystery being the greatest aphrodisiac, and imagination being the most important sex organ. The familiarity of over-exposure has debased the coinage of the hot. The prevalence and availability of porn has trashed the lure of cinematic sex. I grew up when dog-eared, very well-thumbed soft porn books were passed around at school. When schoolboys whispered excitedly about glimpses of bits in films. This was an era when fleapits did roaring trade on the promise of a fleeting second of boob, surrounded by comedy turns from the likes of Bob Todd and Robin Askwith. Knickers and bras were pored over. Porky’s was regarded as sophisticated.
But how can cheeky or titillating – such as they were – function against the backdrop of OnlyFans? The modern audience, to be frank, is spent. Why bother adding simulated sex to your film when the punters can get a look at the real thing for free in seconds? Then, of course, there is the general squeamishness and awkwardness around sex. What filmmaker would want to get themselves into a tangle of intimacy coordinators, lawsuits, social media criticism, and walk into the very centre of a multitude of angry ideological battlefields about consent, identity and sexism? You can and will be judged. Much better, much safer, just to have some punch-ups and some gore, or discuss weighty philosophical issues through the medium of Batman or Star Wars.
I remember some years ago discussing with a friend the likelihood that the pendulum of our culture would, inevitably, swing away from its sexual tone. That pattern – naughty alternating with prudish – has always held true historically; the still shocking outrageousness of Restoration comedy flared only very briefly between Cromwellian Puritanism and the Society for the Reformation of Manners. But how, we wondered, could that possibly happen in our hyper-sexualised age?
The answer was staring us in the face. We now have the deeply unsexy phenomena of ‘sex positivity’ and ‘body positivity’. Everything is out on display, jiggling about on a Pride parade in the open air – but it’s a turn-off, more effective than any bucket of cold water from the Junior Anti-Sex League. Sex is still all around us if we want it – but it is just too much bother. Remember when we used to make jokes about it? That world is as lost as Atlantis.
Relaxation is key to intimacy. You need to relax to begin the different, pleasant, tensions of sex. (Again, yes I know that some people enjoy the risk of being caught – let’s ignore them.) But we cannot relax, because politics and porn have overlaid even more neurosis on to sex, which we were pretty neurotic about anyway. Safer for the cinema, safer for everybody, not to go there.
The joys of Canada by train
There cannot be a lazier way of travelling across Canada than in the Rocky Mountaineer. There are luxury trains, and then there’s this. For two days, I sat in a sumptuously upholstered, air-conditioned carriage, looking out at the vast wilderness of Canada’s interior, as waiters plied me with wine, chocolates and three-course meals. When imagining my trip across the Canadian Rockies, I had envisaged plenty of bracing walks and fresh air. But by the end of my journey, I had gained five-and-a-half pounds.
I went on a walk around the frozen lake accompanied by a guide who warned us about a bear known as the Boss who weighs 497lbs
Admittedly, I was in GoldLeaf, the most luxurious section of this glass-domed, double-decker train. The serfs in SilverLea’ had to descend to the lower deck for their meals, but GoldLeaf passengers could remain in their seats as their food was brought to them. The only reason to get up, apart from a trip to the lavatory, was to visit the viewing platform where you could take pictures of the abundant wildlife – moose, deer, wild horses. Although I was told to watch out for the grizzly bears, which was slightly alarming, given that as soon as I stepped foot on the platform we ground to a complete stop to let a freight train pass. I asked our host – each carriage has its own tour guide – if he kept a shotgun on board in case one of the grizzlies got too close for comfort. He assured me they hadn’t lost anyone yet.
Unlike the Orient Express and other luxury trains, the Rocky Mountaineer doesn’t have any sleeping cars. The reason, a company rep told me, is because the scenery is so spectacular it would be a ‘crime’ to travel through it in darkness. Consequently, my two-day journey, which began at breakfast time in Vancouver and ended after lunch in Lake Louise, was punctuated by an overnight stay at a hotel called the Delta in Kamloops, roughly the midpoint. I’d checked my suitcase in at the railway station on departure and it was waiting for me in my hotel room, having been brought there in a van that races ahead of the train. With your every need taken care of, there’s nothing to distract you from the view outside the window, which is surprisingly variable. One minute you’re inching your way through a post-industrial wasteland, full of rusting cranes and abandoned rolling stock; the next, you’re speeding along at 50mph through the Fraser Valley, with mountain peaks towering in the background.
We passed a town called Hope, which our guide said was where Rambo: First Blood was filmed. Then, a place called Lytton which we were asked not to take pictures of because it had been all but wiped out by a forest fire in 2020 and photographing the charred remains might upset the remaining residents. Only mildly less disturbing was an abandoned TB hospital, which is said to be haunted by the ghosts of all the patients who died there. Guided tours are available on Halloween, apparently.
Several of the rivers and mountains we passed are named after colonialists, such as George Stephens, the first president of the Canadian Pacific Railway, which was a source of some embarrassment to our host. He was keen to emphasise that these landmarks had much older names given to them by the indigenous population – information that was imparted alongside ‘land acknowledgments’, a self-flagellation ritual that Canadians of European ancestry are particularly fond of.
In spite of these anti-colonial sentiments, I refused to think of the adventurers who’d tamed this inhospitable land and accumulated vast fortunes in the process – many of them Scottish – as rapacious capitalists. Rather, you couldn’t help marvelling at their entrepreneurial zeal. They’d built the railroad we were travelling on, as well as the towns and cities we passed along the way. To be fair, the company that owns the Rocky Mountaineer allowed that there was also much to admire about these pioneers – it had named the route we were on ‘First Passage to the West’.
In addition to this picture postcard journey, I had a chance to enjoy a night’s stay at the Fairmont Hotel in Vancouver, one of the grand hotels built by the company that originally owned the railroad. This imposing granite building, which was the tallest in the city until 1972, was officially opened by George IV and Queen Elizabeth on a tour of Canada in 1939. I took advantage of the opportunity to meet up with Simon Fox, a British doctor who emigrated to Vancouver and who’s keen to do something about Justin Trudeau’s relentless assault on free speech. I enlisted him in my efforts to set up a Canadian equivalent of the Free Speech Union, the organisation I started in Britain in 2020. We hope to launch it later this year.
At the conclusion of the trip, I spent two nights at another railroad hotel, the Fairmont Chateau in Lake Louise. Originally built in 1890, it promptly burnt down, only to be rebuilt – and then disappear in another puff of smoke. To this day, there are no fires allowed in the building. During the high season in summer, the resort gets 7,000 to 8,000 visitors a day, keen to explore the maze of local hiking trails. I went on a walk around the frozen lake accompanied by a guide who warned us about a bear known as the Boss who weighs 497lbs. ‘If he holds your gaze for more than five seconds, you know you’re too close,’ he said.
All told, this is one of the great train journeys of the world and I feel privileged to have had the experience. The phrase ‘bucket list’ is over-used, but spending two days on the Rocky Mountaineer, bookended by stays in these majestic railroad hotels, should be on everyone’s bucket list. I returned more determined than ever to save this great country from its ghastly, authoritarian Prime Minister and restore the spirit of adventure embodied by the Scotsmen who made it their home.
To book your trip on the Rocky Mountaineer go to rockymountaineer.com. Prices for the two-day journey start at £1,432 per guest, including an overnight stay in Kamloops. To book a room at the Fairmont Hotel in Vancouver, click here; to book a room at the Fairmount Chateau in Lake Louise, click here.
Two ante-post bets from the same stable
It’s impossible not to like and admire Charlie Fellowes: he is one of those people who gives 100 per cent to whatever he sets his mind to. The Newmarket trainer’s enthusiasm for racing and the horses in his care is infectious, and he is always willing to talk to the media about plans for his stable stars.
In short, Fellowes is a wonderful ambassador for the sport and he deserves all the big-race success that he has enjoyed in his first decade as a trainer. By his own high standards, Fellowes has had a relatively quiet season so far but I am convinced that the second half of his season will be better than the first half for him. My thinking partly comes from the fact that the astute handler is adamant that he has some really promising two-year-olds among his 65-strong string.
The one big race that Fellowes has landed this season is the Victoria Cup at Ascot in May with THE WIZARD OF EYE. I expect that horse to return to the track later this month to contest another valuable seven-furlong handicap: the Moet & Chandon International Stakes on 27 July.
The Wizard of Eye didn’t run badly at Royal Ascot when sixth to Khadeem in the Queen Elizabeth II Jubilee Stakes but that race, and the way he got outpaced early on, told connections that their five-year-old gelding is clearly better suited by seven furlongs than six.
The handicapper has kept Wizard of Eye on a mark of 102 despite his fine run in the Royal Ascot Grade 1 contest – and that official mark is just 3 lbs higher than when he won the Victoria Cup. Back him each way at 12-1 for the International, with Paddy Power, Betfair or Betfred, all offering five places. There is plenty more 12-1 around too with bookies paying just four places.
One horse in the Fellowes yard that deserves a change of luck is GORAK. He got beaten on the nod in a Newmarket handicap in May by Carrytheone, the horse that I tipped last week to win the bet365 Bunbury Cup at Newmarket a week tomorrow. In fact, the form of that Newmarket race looks rock solid and Gorak has dropped to a nice mark of 95, fully 10 lbs lower than a year ago.
In his most recent race, Gorak was drawn on the ‘wrong’ side at Royal Ascot in the Buckingham Palace Stakes when all the action took place on the near side with horses drawn high having a massive advantage. In fact, the first ten home in that 26-runner race were all drawn in stall 18 or higher. Gorak, who was drawn in berth 3, was not disgraced to be 12th because he stayed close to the far rail for the entire race.
Gorak seems suited better to Newmarket than Ascot too, so I think his odds of 25-1 for the Bunbury Cup do him a disservice. Take that price each way with bet365, Paddy Power, Betfair or Unibet, all paying four places. Provided both my each-way tips line up, I will be very happy going into the Bunbury Cup with Carrytheone at 10-1 and Gorak at 25-1 respectively. One word of warning, however: Gorak would not want really soft ground so we have to hope Newmarket misses the worst of the rain next week.
The big race this weekend is the Group 1 Coral Eclipse Stakes at Sandown tomorrow (3.35 p.m.). The race is over 1 mile 2 furlongs and is worth more than £425,000 to the winning connections but it makes no appeal as a betting proposition. City of Troy will win if he runs up to his best but odds of around 1-3 are not tempting in any way. Furthermore, I can’t find a horse I like enough each way to oppose the Betfred Derby winner.
Until 24 hours ago, I had intended to tip several horses running this weekend. That was in the hope that heavy rain would stay clear of Sandown, where I fancied good-ground horses, and that it would tip it down at Haydock, where I was sweet on the chances of a soft-ground horse. Sadly, it is almost certainly going to be Sandown that gets lots of the wet stuff, while Haydock looks as though it will stay largely dry.
However, in the hope that the ground is no worse that ‘good to soft’ at Sandown tomorrow, I am still going to put up two horses.
The first of those is in the Grade 3 Coral Charge (1.50 p.m.) over five furlongs. Live In The Dream will win this race if running up to his best but that’s a pretty big ‘if’ given his poor showing when fifth at Haydock last time out in a listed race. He went off the 5-4 favourite that day but was beaten by more than ten lengths by the winner, Believing.
I would prefer to back MAKAROVA, who was second in this Sandown race last year and will appreciate being dropped in class from her Grade 1 run last time out at Royal Ascot. In the King Charles III Stakes, Ed Walker’s mare ran too freely in her first time-blinkers but still finished a respectable seventh to the Australian hot-shot Asfoora.
The cheekpieces are back on Makarova tomorrow and so back her each way at 13-2 with bet365, BetVictor, Betfred, Ladbrokes or Coral, all paying three places.
In the Coral Challenge (2.25 p.m.), Jonny Portman’s TWO TEMPTING is overpriced, given the horse has won no less than four of his five races this season, including over this course and distance last time out. The five-year-old gelding has struck up a decent partnership with jockey David Egan, who again gets the ride tomorrow.
The handicapper was lenient on Two Tempting for his most recent win, raising him by just 2 lbs to a new mark of 95. Back the horse each way at 15-2 with Betfred or SkyBet, both paying four places. There is plenty of 15-2 around with bookies paying one place less.
Pending:
1 point each way Makarova at 13-2 for the Coral Charge, paying 1/5th odds, 3 places.
1 point each way Two Tempting at 15/2 for the Coral Challenge, paying 1/5th odds, 4 places.
1 point each way Carrytheone at 10-1 for the Bunbury Cup, paying 1/4 odds, 4 places.
1 point each way Gorak at 25-1 for the Bunbury Cup, paying 1/4 odds, 4 places.
1 point each way The Wizard of Eye at 12-1 for the International Stakes, paying 1/5th odds, 5 places.
Last weekend: – 4 points
1 point each way Zoffee at 9-1 for the Northumberland Plate, paying 1/5th odds, six places. Unplaced. – 2 points.
1 point each way Solent Gateway at 25-1 for the Northumberland Plate, paying 1/5th odds, six places. Unplaced – 2 points.
2024 flat season running total + 10.7 points.
2023-4 jumps season: + 42.01 points on all tips.
2023 flat season: – 48.22 points on all tips.
2022-3 jumps season: + 54.3 points on all tips.
My gambling record for the past eight years: I have made a profit in 15 of the past 17 seasons to recommended bets. To a 1 point level stake over this period, the overall profit of has been 517 points. All bets are either 1 point each way or 2 points win (a point is your chosen regular stake).
Who won the general election? Results in maps and charts
Labour has won an historic landslide in yesterday’s general election. The latest forecasts expect Keir Starmer to come to power with 410 seats, with the Tories reduced to a rump of 131. North of the border the SNP have faced disaster and are predicted to retain just six seats.
Perhaps the story of the night, though, will be how well Starmer does with a relatively small share of the vote: 36 per cent. If that number holds true for the rest of the results then that will be lower than the vote achieved by Corbyn in 2017.
The night started with the exit poll that lead to audible gasps in the Sky News studio:
Labour’s vote share is only up a couple of points across the country but Starmer has made real gains in Scotland, where the exit poll suggested that Labour’s vote was up by 18 per cent vs 2019. The SNP are the only victims of this and as it stands are on course to hold just six seats. John Swinney’s future is very much in doubt.
How many Brits bothered to vote? As it stands, turnout is sitting at 59 per cent – down by around 8 per cent since 2019. If these numbers bear out, we’re heading for the lowest turnout since 2005 and the third-lowest turnout this century.
We’ll be tracking the results across the night and updating this article as the seats are counted. Here’s the national picture:
And here’s the gap between Labour’s vote share and share of seats won:
Are the Lib Dems and Reform really right to feel happy?
It’s a disaster, a cataclysm, a wipeout. Half the cabinet will lose their seats, and Labour will be in power for a decade. All those things will be true if the BBC exit poll is anything close to reflecting reality – but hang on a minute. At the risk of sounding like one of those football managers insisting that ‘there are positives to take out of this’ after a five-nil defeat, isn’t there reason for the Tories to feel a bit of relief here? Talk of the Lib Dems overtaking the Conservatives to become His Majesty’s Opposition seems to be wide of the mark. They appear to be nowhere close, ending up with fewer than half the seats won by the Conservatives.
It looks like there are two big winners from this election. Sir Keir Starmer, obviously. But also the two-party system. It has, once again, shown its utter dominance. Neither the Lib Dems nor Reform have been able to inflict more than a small dent in its armour. With a first-past-the-post system, it is extremely difficult for a third party to make inroads into the duopoly of Labour and the Conservatives. It is an entire century since any other party got to lead a government.
Lib Dem deputy leader Daisy Cooper has popped up on the BBC sounding perky about her projected 61 seats, but she really shouldn’t be. Her party looks as doomed as ever to be the Cinderella of UK politics. Cooper kept talking about Britain’s ‘broken voting system’, but does she seriously expect a Starmer government, with a majority of 170 or so, to change it? The Lib Dems had a brief opportunity in 2010 to alter the voting system when they persuaded David Cameron to offer a referendum on the Alternative Vote, but they lost. And what was that about Nigel Farage’s claim that ‘something is going on out there’? Yes, something was going on – but nothing even nearly sufficient to break the two-party system.
Unless Sir John Curtice turns out to have had a nightmare, there is one conclusion to be drawn from this evening: the Tories will be back. Not, perhaps, in 2029 or even 2034, but once the public inevitably grows tired and angry with Labour, it will be the Conservatives who will return to government, not the Lib Dems, Reform, or anyone else. Any ambitious 25-year-old who fancies a career in politics, go out and join the Conservative party tomorrow. Get in there now while the party is on its knees. You will have an excellent chance of becoming prime minister by the time you are 40.
This exit poll is truly devastating for the Tories
If Tories find some comfort in getting into three figures in the exit poll, they are kidding themselves.
Not only are the Tories on course to record a significantly lower number of seats than it won at its modern nadir of 1997, but it has lost its parliamentary monopoly over right-of-centre opinion too.
Yes, it looks like there will be sufficient Conservative MPs to put together a workable shadow cabinet and frontbench. Yes, it will be a Tory who leads the interrogations of Sir Keir Starmer at PMQs rather than bungee-jumping Sir Ed Davey.
But Nigel Farage must be presumed to be home and hosed in Clacton, and to be taking at least a handful of fellow Reformers into the Commons given the forecast of 13 seats for his latest insurgency.
Farage has for now completely captured the once totemic Tory issue of immigration control
He has for now completely captured the once totemic Tory issue of immigration control, made a big grab for the mantle of Britain’s chief tax-cutting champion and placed himself in the vanguard of a growing movement prepared to resist the dash to carbon net zero too.
With the legitimacy and platform a seat in parliament and a parliamentary party will give him – not to mention a small fortune in Short Money to fund a working professional party structure – his tail will be up.
If the Conservatives do not put their all into covering their right flank over the next year then they will lose more voters to the Farage insurgency. And their chances of successfully defending high watermark county council seats next spring will be negligible.
Why might they not bolster their right side? Simply because the ‘One Nation’ wing of the party may well seek to argue that the Tories lost so badly in many of their traditional ‘blue wall’ strongholds in the South East and South West owing to them pushing an excessively right-wing agenda.
If the primary Tory mission gets defined as winning back leafy commuter belt seats lost to the Lib Dems then Farage will be staring at an open goal.
The policy mix the Conservatives will pursue in opposition depends to a great extent on who emerges triumphant from their imminent next leadership election (‘not another one’). That will in turn depend on which two candidates get presented to the party membership. It is by no means beyond the bounds of possibility that MPs on the left of the party will keep a full-blooded right-winger off the ballot.
Were, for instance, Tom Tugendhat to emerge victorious from the leadership contest then there is every chance of the new Lib Dem MPs in the blue wall serving one term only. But in hundreds of other seats, the meaningful contest at the next general election would then be Labour versus Reform.
Under a Kemi Badenoch, Suella Braverman or Robert Jenrick and with a far more punchy immigration-sceptic agenda the party may be able to fend off Farage outside the south. But that may go down like a lead balloon with socially liberal blue wall voters.
At the last general election, the Tories were celebrating having become beneficiaries of a remarkable political realignment. Now they find they cannot ride two horses that are pulling in sharply different directions. Which way they decide to jump will be crucial.
As they stare alternately at Farage to their right and Davey to their left, they will need to answer the Dirty Harry question: Do we feel lucky?
The election result could kill Scottish independence for a generation
The exit poll puts the SNP on ten seats. That is very much at the low end of the spectrum of expectations among the Nationalists. The party won 48 out of 59 Scottish seats in 2019. There are 57 constituencies north of the border, and if John Swinney has managed to win only ten of those, he and his rank and file will be bitterly disappointed. On the ITV results programme, Nicola Sturgeon stuck the boot in, describing the exit poll as ‘the grimmer end of expectations for the SNP’ and said the party’s campaign failed to put forward a ‘unique selling point’.
Swinney, formerly Sturgeon’s number two, stepped forward in May to replace her immediate successor Humza Yousaf, following 13 disastrous months in charge of the devolved Scottish government. He was sold as a safe pair of hands who could save the SNP from catastrophic losses in this election, but ten seats isn’t all that different to what might have been expected had Yousaf led the party into the election. The Swinney experiment has failed and failed categorically.
Four observations off the back of this.
First, Scottish independence is dead for at least a generation. With just a handful of Commons seats and a beleaguered Holyrood administration under fire for failing to deliver after 17 years in office, the SNP can no longer apply the same constitutional pressure on Westminster. A Labour government won’t have to give a second referendum a second thought.
Second, Swinney’s leadership will now come under question. He has only been in the job for two months but he has also been a senior figure in the party leadership since 2007, almost without interruption. It will be very difficult for him to argue that he is the agent of change who can take the SNP forward and rebuild it.
Third, Labour must now be considered the favourite to win the 2026 Scottish parliament election, which would bring to an end two decades of SNP control and instal Anas Sarwar in Bute House as first minister. If tonight is the night that restores Labour as the dominant party of Scottish politics, 2026 will be the test of whether that dominance has any depth to it. On these numbers, it looks like it might.
Fourth, the UK-wide exit poll isn’t as accurate when it comes to Scotland as it is in the rest of the country. Last time around, it overstated the SNP vote. With that caveat stated, it is not impossible that the SNP ends up with fewer seats than the Scottish Tories. That would be a seismic event.
The SNP’s message for many years now has been that independence would render Scotland a ‘Tory-free’ country. If Scotland has returned more Tories to Westminster than Nationalists, that would be a devastating blow for the SNP.
Labour majority of 170, says exit poll
The polls have closed and the exit poll is in. The BBC exit poll projects that Labour will win a landslide of 410 MPs and the Conservatives will be left with 131 seats. Meanwhile the Liberal Democrats will win 61 seats, the SNP ten seats and Reform 13 seats. This would mean a Labour majority of 170 – and would be the Tories’ worst ever result.
If this comes to pass, this will be Labour’s largest number of seats, but a slightly smaller majority than the Tony Blair landslide of 179. This seems to be down to the the level of success that Ed Davey’s party has enjoyed (if the poll is right). If correct, the Liberal Democrats have succeeded in conquering the once true blue stronghold of Surrey. However, Labour figures will be nothing short of delighted with this result. It would give Keir Starmer a huge majority from which to govern.
It would be a devastating result for the Conservative party. However, it would still be better than some of the recent polling predictions that the Tories could be the third largest party – with the Liberal Democrats taking second place. This is on the top end of many of the MRP predictions for the party in recent days – so as bad as it is, there is likely to be very light relief in Conservative Campaign Headquarters that a total wipeout may have been avoided. The other big loser would be the SNP: reduced to a mere ten MPs.
However, one of the biggest winners from this would be Reform – Nigel Farage’s party will have defied expectations by winning parliamentary representation in double figures. When Farage first returned, winning about five MPs was seen as a big achievement. In recent days, Reform party figures have reported Labour votes moving to them so some of the gains could be encroaching on Labour – rather than just the Tories – if so.
So, how likely is the exit poll to match reality? While the BBC’s exit poll for the 1992 election missed John Major’s win and predicted that no party would win an overall majority, they have been very accurate in recent years. For the past five UK elections, the exit poll has predicted how many seats will be won by the winning party within an average of four seats. It means this will be treated as an accurate account of what is likely to unfold in the coming hours. But we’ll only really know for sure when the counts get underway and the vote swings become clear.
Listen to more analysis from Katy Balls and Kate Andrews:
As it happened: Starmer appoints cabinet after landslide win
Prime Minister Keir Starmer has appointed his cabinet after winning a landslide in the general election. Rachel Reeves has been announced as the first ever female Chancellor and Angela Rayner is deputy prime minister. With one seat left to count, Labour has won 412 seats, and the Tories 121. Starmer will enter government on a vote share of 35 per cent, the lowest of any majority government in the democratic era.
Here’s what unfolded:
- Keir Starmer has appointed his cabinet: Rachel Reeves is Chancellor; Angela Rayner is deputy PM; David Lammy is Foreign Secretary; Yvette Cooper is Home Secretary.
- John Healey has been appointed Defence Secretary; Liz Kendall is Work and Pensions Secretary; Louise Haigh is Transport Secretary; and Lisa Nandy is Culture Secretary.
- Former chief scientific advisor Sir Patrick Vallance has been appointed minister of state for science. James Timpson has been made minister of state for prisons.
- Rishi Sunak stepped down as PM earlier today. ‘I have heard your anger’, he said in his final statement in Downing Street.
- Eleven Tory cabinet ministers lost their seats in the election. Former prime minister Liz Truss was defeated. Senior Tories Jacob Rees-Mogg, Miriam Cates and Therese Coffey also lost their seats.
- Labour enters government on a 35 per cent vote share – the lowest of any governing party since 1923, and the lowest for a majority government since the Acts of Union in 1800.
- Nigel Farage won Clacton, on his eighth attempt to become an MP. Reform’s Richard Tice, Lee Anderson, Rupert Lowe and James McMurdock also won seats.
- Two Labour frontbenchers, Jonathan Ashworth and Thangam Debbonaire, lost their seats.
- Jeremy Corbyn won Islington North as an independent. George Galloway lost his Rochdale seat to Labour. Five pro-Gaza independents were elected.
- The SNP won nine seats, losing 39 from the last election.
Here’s how the election unfolded on our live blog:
Your guide for general election night 2024
After six weeks of campaigning, we are finally here. The bongs of Big Ben at 10 p.m. mark the end of voting across the UK and the start of an election night full of drama. Labour are set to make huge gains at the respective expense of the Tories in England and the SNP in Scotland. The Liberal Democrats will try to topple as much of the ‘blue wall’ across the south as possible, while Reform will hope Nigel Farage, Richard Tice and Lee Anderson enter the new Commons too.
Following the publication of the exit poll, there is then a lull until shortly before midnight when the first seats in the north-east of England come in. Around 1 a.m. we get East Kilbride & Strathaven, Hamilton & Clyde Valley and Rutherglen to provide a first indication of patterns of voting in Scotland. After that, the flow of results begins to pick up, with just over 60 seats due to declare between 2 a.m. and 3 a.m.
The hour between 3 a.m. to 4 a.m. is likely to be the busiest time of the night, with nearly 250 declarations expected. Thereafter, the remaining seats are likely to follow the established voting trends. Recounts could delay some of the declarations from earlier, but every seat will begin counting overnight meaning there is a good chance that all 650 results will be in by mid-morning.
10 p.m. Exit poll is announced
This year’s exit poll by Ipsos will be carried out by interviewers at 133 polling stations across the country. Tens of thousands of people will be asked to privately fill in a replica ballot as they leave, to get an indication of how they voted. Exit polls have got it wrong in the past – predicting hung parliaments in both 1992 and 2015 polls – but tend to be within a few points of the final result.
11.30 p.m. First seats start to declare
The newly-created constituency of Blyth and Ashington in the north-east is expected to be the first result due this year. Labour’s Ian Lavery is predicted to hold this Red Wall bastion, having sat for the previous seat of Wansbeck since 2010. Bridget Phillipson’s seat of Houghton and Sunderland South could be the second seat to declare at around 11.45 p.m.
12.15 a.m. Basildon and Billericay
This declaration could give us the ‘Portillo moment’ of 2024. Basildon and Billericay is set to be the first declaration of the night featuring a Tory cabinet minister who could lose his seat. Conservative chairman Richard Holden was controversially parachuted in here at the start of the election campaign, after his old constituency of North West Durham was abolished in the boundary review. Polls currently have this true-blue Essex constituency as a three-way tie with Labour and Reform.
12.30 a.m. Swindon South
This is the first of the bellwether seats to declare. Swindon South looks set to fall to Labour as former justice secretary Sir Robert Buckland tries to defend the constituency he has represented since 2010.
2 a.m – Reform barometer
The first test of the ‘Farage effect’ will be in Castle Point, one of the Thames Estuary seats where Reform will try to overturn a large Tory majority of 26,000. Rebecca Harris has represented this constituency since 2010, with Ukip managing to win 31 per cent of the vote here in 2015.
2.30 a.m. Galloway’s moment in Rochdale
Four months after the controversial Rochdale by-election, George Galloway will try to retain his seat against former journalist turned Labour candidate Paul Waugh. Expect fireworks with the speeches, however this seat goes.
3 a.m. Cheltenham starts the avalanche
The biggest wave of election night results is expected between 3 a.m. and 4 a.m. The first of the likely possible big scalps is the Lord Chancellor Alex Chalk in Cheltenham. He scraped home here in 2019, winning a majority of just 981. Having won every seat on the local council, the Lib Dems look nailed-on to win this one.
3 a.m. Chingford and Woodford Green
Can Iain Duncan Smith hold on? At the beginning of this campaign, the former Tory leader looked set to lose the seat he has held since 1997. But then Labour intervened to block their longtime candidate Faiza Shaheen. She has now chosen to stand as an independent against her replacement Shama Tatler, potentially splitting the vote and offering IDS an improbable lifeline.
3 a.m. Islington North
Across London, another former leader is also battling to save his career. Four years after losing the Labour whip, Jeremy Corbyn is now standing as an independent against Praful Nargund in Islington North. Having sat for the seat since 1983, Corbyn is a well-liked local MP but now looks set to narrowly lose, according to the current polls.
3 a.m. Midlothian bellwether
Having switched back and forth between Labour and the SNP over the last decade, Midlothian is a key battleground for Anas Sarwar and Keir Starmer. Incumbent Owen Thompson goes head-to-head here with Gordon Brown’s ex-special adviser, Kirsty McNeill.
3.15 a.m. Bristol Central
Thangam Debonnaire won the old Bristol West seat here in 2019 by a margin of more than 28,000 votes but boundary changes mean her majority has been slashed to about half of that. She is battling to avoid becoming the only shadow cabinet casualty of the night against Carla Denyer, the co-leader of the Greens.
3.30 a.m. Chichester and another ‘Portillo moment’
Gillian Keegan’s traditionally blue Chichester seat is now an ambitious Lib Dem targets. The Education Secretary won here with a stonking majority of 21,490 in 2019, but if Sir Ed Davey’s party are having a good night then she could be in real trouble here.
3.30 a.m. Jeremy Hunt in Godalming and Ash
This could be the biggest scalp of the night. No sitting Chancellor has ever lost their seat before but Jeremy Hunt could become the first. Having represented the old constituency of South West Surrey since 2005, his fears are demonstrated by the sheer amount of time he has spent on the campaign trail in this formerly safe Conservative seat. Hunt’s majority in 2019 was 8,817. Can the Liberal Democrats pull it off?
3.30 a.m. Penny Mordaunt in Portsmouth North
Around the time that Jeremy Hunt’s seat is expected to declare, we should know whether or not Penny Mordaunt has survived too. The Leader of the House has been touted by many as a potential replacement should Sunak make his expected departure in the wake of an election defeat. But her majority of 15,780 in Portsmouth North looks in danger, however, as polls suggest she is neck-and-neck with Labour’s Amanda Martin.
3.30 a.m. Grant Shapps in Welwyn Hatfield
The Defence Secretary and potential leadership contender is another Conservative ‘big beast’ who could be in danger in his Hertfordshire seat. Shapps was first elected here in 2005 but is defending a majority of 10,773 and Labour needs a swing of 10.4 percentage points to win.
4 a.m. Richard Tice in Boston and Skegness
One of Reform’s two key target seats of the night. Party chairman Richard Tice is taking on Matt Warman in a seat which won the latter won with more than 75 per cent of the vote in 2019.
4 a.m. Clacton
Arguably the most hotly anticipated race of the night. At his eighth attempt of trying, will Nigel Farage finally be able to win a coveted seat in Parliament? If yes, the fallout could be seismic – Conservatives up and down the country will be watching this one with bated breath. Farage is up against Giles Watling, who succeeded Farage’s old rival Douglas Carswell here in 2017.
4 a.m. Dartford bellwether
This Kent constituency is the longest-running ‘bellwether’ seat in the country. Since 1964, whichever party wins Dartford has also gone on to form the government. Tory candidate Gareth Johnson is defending a majority here of 14,704, with Labour needing a swing of 15.9 points to take the seat.
4 a.m. Richmond and North Allerton
The Prime Minister’s revised seat has voted Tory since the Tamworth manifesto. Only a truly devastating night could produce anything other than a Conservative win here. But barring a Labour upset to produce the ‘Portillo moment’ to top all ‘Portillo moments’, this declaration will be worth watching as it will likely prompt Rishi Sunak’s first public comments of the night.
4.15 a.m. Holborn and St Pancras
Keir Starmer’s victory is all but guaranteed here. But his speech, delivered minutes after Rishi Sunak’s, will likely be the first public words he makes on the day he becomes Prime Minister.
4.15 a.m. Uxbridge and South Ruislip
Boris Johnson’s old seat was hotly contested in the 2023 by-election, a race dominated by Ulez rows. In a rematch of that contest, the re-selected Labour candidate Danny Beales will try to overturn Tory Steve Tuckwell’s slim majority of just 495.
4.30 a.m. Lee Anderson in Ashfield
In Nottinghamshire, Ashfield residents will find out if Conservative-turned-Reform candidate Lee Anderson has held the seat he won by a majority of 5,733 in 2019. This is a fascinating three-way split with Rhea Keehn hoping to retake the seat for Labour.
4.30 a.m. Jacob Rees-Mogg in Somerset
If Jacob Rees-Mogg were to be defeated in Somerset North East and Hanham, it will likely be one of the most symbolic moments of the election. The Lib Dems are seeking to turn the rural South West orange, while Labour have chosen Dan Norris, the current mayor of the West of England.
5.30 a.m. South West Norfolk
As the sun rises over the Norfolk Broads, Liz Truss will wait to find out her fate. With a majority of 26,195, she ought to be safe in the safe she has represented since 2010. But former Tory rival James Bagge has made waves by standing as an independent.
5.30 a.m. Finchley and Golders Green
Labour’s Sarah Sackman is taking on David Cameron’s former aide Alex Deane in a potentially symbolic result in this North London constituency. Finchley has a large Jewish population and was famously Margaret Thatcher’s old seat. After the trauma of the Corbyn years, a Labour win here would carry special significance.
The plot to stop Marine Le Pen’s National Rally
This week France has drifted from surprise to confusion and panic as Sunday’s second round vote approaches. The bien-pensant centre-left weekly Nouvel Obs’ cover says it all. Black lettering on a red background menacingly warns: ‘Avoiding the Worst’; ‘The National Rally at the gates of power’. Yet the National Rally is an officially recognised legitimate mainstream party. France is not staring into the abyss. But if we were to indulge in such gloom-ridden musings what would be France’s post-electoral worst case scenarios. Let us begin gently.
Marine Le Pen called this ‘an administrative coup d’etat’
In the event the National Rally cannot form a government on Monday, moves are already afoot by Macronist troops to cobble together a broad coalition that would stretch across the political divide from right-wing Republicans to the left, but exclude the National Rally and the radical-left France Unbowed party. Policies would of necessity incorporate expensive left-wing manifesto pledges certain to worsen France’s atrocious public finances and frighten the markets.
The 5th Republican constitution was neither designed for, nor does it possess, a coalition culture unlike continental Europe. Given the large numbers of National Rally and France Unbowed deputies that will be elected after 7 July, the wobbly Macronist coalition would be perpetually at the mercy of no confidence votes. Were Macron able to keep it afloat, it could pass legislation enabling a change of the electoral system to proportional representation. Mindful of the National Rally’s high-water mark 33 per cent vote share, that would stymy an National Rally outright majority as soon as elections could be held anew from 8 July 2025.
But in the likelihood of such a coalition collapsing, France would lapse into chronic instability and policy stalemate for a year until the president was able to dissolve anew. The impact on financial markets would be Liz Truss-like.
The L’Opinion newspaper wrote this week that the French cabinet, chaired by the president, discussed calling an emergency cabinet meeting for Monday, in the event of an National Rally outright majority. The aim would be for the president to take advantage of his constitutional privilege to appoint key senior civil servants, police, military, and thereby assure himself of the counter-signature of his last tame prime minister. Marine Le Pen called this ‘an administrative coup d’etat’. It would be guaranteed to ratchet up tension with the incoming government.
The nationwide febrile atmosphere has today provoked the Interior Minister to draft in 30,000 police across France from Sunday. Already radical left politicians are talking of ‘resistance’ if the National Rally forms a government. Trade unions have pledged to continue the struggle. Ultra-left professional rioters will provoke destruction and violence at public demonstrations and then blame an National Rally controlled police. The greatest fear is banlieues involvement.
Should French institutions be threatened the president could invoke article 16. One of the most powerful instruments of the constitution, it grants him emergency powers that are so far reaching as to be described by one constitutional historian as being as absolutist as those of Louis XIV.
The worst of all scenarios would be revolution or coup d’état. It is no secret that Jean-Luc Mélenchon, a devotee of the ruthless French Revolution leader Robespierre, favours radicalising French politics to provoke upheaval. French revolutions were, after all, a laboratory for Karl Marx and inspiration for his writings on class struggle.
Never far from revolution is the prospect of a disgruntled military staging a coup d’état. Barely two years ago, senior retired and serving officers warned in a collective letter about the state of France and how they would be the final recourse should things turn sour. The coup d’états that have punctuated French politics since the Revolution do not just belong to the distant past with Napoleon 1 in 1799 or Napoleon III in 1852. In 1958, at the height of the Algerian War during the stalemated 4th Republic, the so-called ‘coup d’état du 13 mai’ rocked France. Army officers took control in Algeria – then an integral part of France like Northern Ireland for the UK – and paratroopers seized Corsica, threatening to take Paris. Their aim was to force the 4th Republic’s president to accept General de Gaulle’s return with powers to draft a new constitution, the 5th Republic. But nor was the 5th immune. In 1961, generals staged another coup in Algeria. And at the height of rioting and strikes in 1968 General de Gaulle secretly disappeared to Germany to garner support from the commander of the French army on the Rhine.
France is a modern, mature democracy. The National Rally should be allowed to come to power legitimately if the 10.6 million first round French voters confirm their choice on Sunday. Using subterfuge to deny popular will is a greater danger.