The “red wall” voters who helped deliver Boris Johnson’s election victory will be disproportionately affected by Brexit even in the event of a deal being agreed, storing up trouble for the prime minister in 2024, according to a report. With the new wave of Tory MPs in former Labour strongholds forced to choose between supporting Johnson over his handling of coronavirus lockdowns in the north and answering to their constituents facing job losses, the report forecasts more trouble after Brexit.
It classes 35 of the constituencies as “vulnerable” to a Brexit job shock because they rely so heavily on manufacturing. As the gains made by the Conservative party in 2019 were so slender, they could easily be reversed by job losses or the uncertainty to livelihoods caused by Brexit, says the Manufacturing in the Marginals report, compiled by a former Foreign Office official and high commissioner. In a fresh look at the consequences of Brexit, Paul McGrade weighed up the number of votes that delivered the Tories’ majority against manufacturing jobs, constituency by constituency. In some constituencies the capacity for Brexit shock is greater because so many key jobs are concentrated in one sector. For example, in Bury North, where the Tories took the seat from Labour by 105 votes, there are 4,500 people in manufacturing jobs, with many in the chemical industry, a sector recently identified as at risk from Brexit. The chemicals company BASF, which has six sites in the UK, has said Brexit will add a £1bn of costs to its business, even if there is a deal, potentially threatening the future of some of its operations and those in supply chains that use their chemicals in paint, coatings and agriculture. This is because it faces £50,000-£60,000 in additional costs to go through a new compliance process for each of its 1,300 unique chemicals, because the UK is coming out of the EU’s Reach regulation system. “Given how exposed the chemical industry is to trade disruption with the EU, owing to its heavily regulated nature, this underlines how economic harm to manufacturing could do significant electoral damage in these Tory-held marginals,” says the report. “In Bury, where the Conservatives won two seats on very slim majorities, and in neighbouring Heywood and Middleton, the scale of employment in the chemical industry is very high, amounting to 4,495 jobs.” The challenges flow from Britain’s departure from the single market and the customs union and will be faced irrespective of a deal being struck. “The risks from no deal are well known. But our report, for the first time, maps where manufacturing jobs are at risk in every constituency in Britain, deal or no deal. In much of the blue/red wall, the number of jobs potentially at risk far outweighs the current political majorities, which shows the scale of the post-Brexit challenge for the Conservatives and for Labour if they want to hold or win those seats at the next election,” said McGrade, who is Brexit counsel at Lexington Communications.
If the ratio of factory jobs to Tory majority votes can be said to be roughly 40:1 in Bury North using this “risk” calculation, the next most vulnerable seat for the Conservatives is High Peak in Derbyshire. Home to thermoplastics manufacturers, chemical suppliers and metal castings companies, it has more than 6,000 manufacturing jobs, compared with the Tory majority of 590 votes – a 10:1 ratio. Also vulnerable to a Brexit manufacturing decline are Bolton North East and Blyth Valley, where the number of factory jobs is nine times greater than the Tory margin of victory. Other areas deemed at risk include the West Midlands, which has 30,000 jobs in the motor industry across five constituencies. Solihull, home to Jaguar Land Rover, will be particularly vulnerable, says the report. “In a lot of these constituencies, these are the best jobs around and are highly skilled,” said McGrade. The east has a huge reliance on the pharmaceutical industry, bringing the number of jobs in manufacturing up to 242,000 across five constituencies including Cambridge and Welwyn Hatfield. The report says it recognises that manufacturing is not some sort of “political kryptonite” for the Conservatives, but adds: “The fact that these votes were won, in the words of the prime minister, on the strength of ‘borrowed votes’, means they are vulnerable to switching next time.”