The ten most surprising facts from the 2024 election revealed |
As a landmark study of the 2024 election is published, The Conversation asked Tim Bale, who co-authored with Rob Ford, Will Jennings and Paula Surridge, to reveal the ten most surprising facts to come out of their analysis.
Labour won the election but its support fell a lot more than any other party’s during the campaign period. Labour started the campaign 25 percentage points ahead of the Conservatives and ended it just 15 points ahead.
That was partly because a fair few people who might have voted Labour either voted tactically for the Liberal Democrats in the end or didn’t bother to vote at all as it looked like Labour was heading for an easy win. But the loss was also down to some voters’ concerns about Labour’s lack of ambition and some concerns about its stance on Israel-Gaza. This helps to explain why the Greens enjoyed a late surge.
Since coming to office, the government has been plagued by indecision about what to do about taxes and fearful of angering voters.
But our analysis shows voters expected all along that a Starmer government would put taxes up – and they were apparently reconciled to it. Neither Rachel Reeves’s pledges not to increase the big three taxes, nor Tory attacks on Labour tax rises seem to have had any discernible........