General election 2017

Thursday

Andrew Marr

Diary – 20 April 2017

We are all drama queens, really, we political hacks; and so we were all thoroughly delighted by Theresa May’s Tuesday coup. I have long been arguing that we would have an election this year, and I had been beginning to feel lonely. But one big thing I got wrong: it had seemed to me in January that a Brexit election would shatter much party discipline, since the voters would be principally interested in where candidates stood on the Great Issue and both Tories and Labour were deeply divided about it. However, by framing the current contest in the way she has, May has deftly but brutally carved away the long

The Spectator

Barometer | 20 April 2017

Back to the Foot year This year’s election has been likened to that of 1983 when, under Michael Foot’s leadership, Labour scored its worst result since 1918. What happened? — Labour’s vote share fell 36.9% to 27.6% and their seats from 261 to 209. — The Conservatives also lost vote share, down 1.5% to 42.4%. But their seats increased from 359 to 397, giving them a majority of 140, against just 43 in 1979. — This was the first of two elections fought by the Liberal/SDP Alliance. They gained an impressive 25.4% of the vote, up 11.6% on the Liberal performance in 1979. But this translated into just 11 seats.