In his pocket, Keir Starmer carries around a list of the 150 target seats Labour wants to gain at the next election, most of them from the Conservatives. Before the latest round of byelections, the party needed to hit 124 of those targets to win a majority in parliament of just one seat. The fact that Selby and Ainsty is not even on the Labour leader’s list shows just what a historic result this is for the opposition, winning its biggest ever byelection victory by overturning a 20,000 Conservative majority. If the swing of nearly 24 percentage points were repeated nationally, it would lead to a landslide general election victory. Results across all three byelections suggest the national mood has turned against the Tories, and may not return in time for next year’s election.
The Tories had predicted all three races would be tough, arguing that governing parties always lose, even though four recent byelections show that is not always the case. But the scale of the swings in Selby, and in Somerton and Frome, still took many by surprise. Sir John Curtice, a professor of politics at the University of Strathclyde, told the BBC on Friday morning: “The tide is still a long way out for the Conservatives and they still have an awful long way to go before they look as though they might have a chance to retain power.” Yet Rishi Sunak will take some small comfort from avoiding becoming the first prime minister since 1968 to lose three byelections on the same day. Although the Tories slipped to defeat to Labour in Selby, and to the Liberal Democrats in Somerton and Frome, they clung on in Boris Johnson’s old seat of Uxbridge and South Ruislip. The Tories argue that Uxbridge, which they retained by just 495 votes, showed that people were unconvinced by Starmer, were worried about what Labour would do in government and would vote against him when given a good reason to do so.
The Labour leader’s allies, however, believe the result vindicates their ruthless discipline on unfunded spending commitments and focus on the centre ground, despite some concerns internally that Starmer’s electoral strategy leaves the party too light when confronted by difficult local issues. The Tories also point to the fact that Selby and Somerton were lost not so much because of thousands of Tory voters switching parties but because so many stayed at home. In Selby, the Tories dropped 21,000 votes, but Labour gained fewer than 3,000. In Somerton, they lost 26,000 but the Lib Dems picked up just over 4,000. Sunak’s allies hope that if the economy begins to recover, they may be able to reignite the enthusiasm of their former voters, although the results also underline just how much the coalition of Brexit supporters that gave Johnson his 2019 majority has collapsed. Some Tories believe Uxbridge shows that Labour’s huge national poll lead may be vulnerable, especially when they find the right local issues to campaign on, as they did with Sadiq Khan’s plan to extend London’s ultra-low emission zone (Ulez). Yet polling experts believe that weaponising local “wedge” issues in constituencies where Labour is in charge, such as the Ulez in London or the NHS in Wales, will only take the Tories so far without a more appealing, and generalised, national narrative.
But there are also reasons for Tory despair, not least the scale of the losses. Selby is 237th on Labour’s list of target seats, and the party has not achieved such a large swing at a byelection since it won Dudley West in 1994 – three years before its landslide victory. Both Selby and Somerton were won with substantial tactical voting by Labour and Lib Dem voters. The Lib Dems came sixth in Selby, while Labour came fifth in Somerton, with a vote share so low the party lost its deposit. A similar pattern at the general election could heighten Tory losses across the UK.
Ed Davey, the leader of the Lib Dems, will be delighted with his party’s fourth byelection gain this parliament, but the party has made little advance nationally and, despite snapping Tory heels across the blue wall, has not yet made a compelling national offer. Labour believes that, under the new constituency boundaries, it should be able to hang on to Selby next year. For now, it is enjoying the victory. “Selby was never even vaguely close to our target list,” said one insider. “If we hold it, we could have 350 Labour MPs.” Keir Starmer may need to expand his list.