Why are people saying it's a Labour landslide when Labour under Corbyn got more votes?

[Appalonia]

I think this is what's shocked me, there hasn't been a sudden swing to the Left, it's that the Conservative vote has been massively impacted by support for Reform. Ironic really, so many pp voting for a more right wing party than the Tories and Labour get in!

I think Labour will have to be very careful, they don't have the mandate they think they do. And think they've been handed a bit of a poisoned chalice, considering the mess this country is in. Will be interesting seeing how this plays out...

https://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.theguardian.com/politics/article/2024/jul/05/labour-wins-big-uk-electoral-system-creaking

This is a good article that relates to this thread.

Agreed.

Johnson's share of seats was higher than his share of votes. Not by as much as Starmer, but still about 43% vote share to 57% seats so crucially, his seats gave him a majority even though the vote share didn't.
I don't remember this much hand wringing.

Yes. https://www.theguardian.com/politics/article/2024/jun/27/labour-lib-dem-tactical-voting-plans-impact-tory-seats

They didn’t cooperate in the sense of standing aside or making formal pacts but they both targeted their resources very carefully. The Lib Dems have been fairly explicit in saying that they only targeted seats where they were second to the tories.

There was an interesting article in the FT about the Labour strategy and in it they talk about the redeployment of activists from Labour held seats to Tory ones and how they improved the efficiency of their canvassing by using data to direct activists to where they would have the biggest chance of unseating a Tory. https://www.ft.com/content/9b8e07b2-ff88-4fc0-a82e-4ddc99623560

I’d say the same about all the fuss over a “super majority” ie a made up thing that no one cares about when the Tories had a large majority

I think the reason it's being scrutinised is that it's quite marked this time. The disparity between vote share and seats is stunning.
For me personally, as a lefty, it's because people say Starmer did so much better than Jeremy Corbyn, when in actual fact, in terms of vote share that's just false.
Labour did well this time in large part due to Reform splitting the Tory vote.
Labour's victory is pretty fragile to be honest. It's not a resounding mandate from the British people by any means.

I'm just watching The Last Leg and a comedian said this wouldn't have happened if Corbyn had been leader. Corbyn election got more votes than this one. It's Reform that lost the Tories this election, there's NOT been a massive swing to the left. Yes pp do want change, but I feel v uneasy with this false narrative, especially with such a low turnout.

Sorry, I just realised I said basically just the same as you! Was just annoyed by watching The Last Leg.

And I think it is important to scrutinise the figures and what's behind it. Nigel Farage feels v emboldened by the relative success of Reform and Labour need to not be complacent just because they've got these seats. It could all change v quickly.

Lots of comments from right wing press of "fake landslide" , we need PR, etc, etc.

When Boris won, none of these papers (or jubilent Tories) said nowt.

It didn't help that a section of the party were actively working against them winning.

why-are-people-saying-its-a-labour-landslide-when-labour-under-corbyn-got-more-votes?

Because we have a system of 'First past the post' which now means the Labour Government can push through any changes they want as even if every MP from every other party all agreed with each other on any single issue (incredibly unlikely) they wouldn't have enough votes to stop anything Labour want to push through.

It's quite worrying really, whoever you voted for.

Yes. This is true.

Sadly what they are going to deliver is a complete ass fucking to people who already pay loads of tax.

And then, the money will be wasted.

We might get a bit of brain drain as well.

Labour campaigners in safe seats were twinned with more marginal ones and bussed there to campaign for them. This caused quite a lot of annoyance with the campaign teams who wanted to be out campaigning in their own constituencies rather then being deployed halfway across the country but was remarkably effective. It might have depressed the vote share in the safe seat, but it increased it in the marginal one to the point where they won both.

It takes a special kind of mind to be a Corbyn supporter.

Yes, Corbyn who lost in 2019 by getting 202 seats to the Conservative's 365 did much better than Kier Starmer who got 412 seats to the Tory's 121. -163 is obviously bigger than +291.

It’s not about co-operation. It’s about where most national resources were pooled in terms of door knocking and getting the message out. They aren’t working together in terms of standing aside they are both working individually to maximise the number of seats they get efficiently. Often it turns out to be mutually beneficial. Sometimes it leads to Tories winning instead. (Bits of the SW I am looking at you). Depends on the constituency and how the Tory vote fragments I guess.

I'd also add that the electorate being able to boot out an unpopular administration and give them a kicking is actually one of the great benefits of FPTP. Personally, I lean towards electoral reform, but our system does make it easier than many do to vote against a party.

they don't have the mandate they think they do

I’m pretty sure they understand the figures even better than all of us on this thread do…

Yes, FPTP is terrible. We need PR. But you can’t just look at the figures and say “this is how many seats you’ve had got under PR” because the parties would campaign differently, and people would vote differently. The Lib Dems, for instance, got a huge number of seats for the number of votes - because they concentrated on the constituencies where they knew they could win. Under PR they probably would have campaigned differently. Personally I voted Labour, because LD had no chance in my area, under PR I would have voted for them.

Having said the above, it’s obvious that Reform would have got many more MPs under PR.

Our whole political system would have to change if we had PR though, we’re set up for a government and an opposition, and that’s probably not what we would have.

I agree that this couldn’t have happened under Corbyn. What people are missing by continuing to discuss Corbyn’s vote share is what was quite rightly pointed out by earlier.

Elections aren’t won by the party faithful. Elections are won by swing voters in marginal seats. Corbyn didn’t understand this and as such could never have won a majority. Lots of people (including me) voted Labour in 2019 because they were desperate to get Brexit sorted in a less right wing way. I don’t like Corbyn and I wasn’t voting for him. But my vote is a drop in the ocean in my safe Tory seat where the Labour candidate came third because of all the anti-Corbyn scaremongering by the local Tories.

Please don’t count my vote that year as a vote for Corbyn. It wasn’t. I will never forgive him for playing idealistic student politics with the only opposition party with a chance of winning and this delaying the change we so desperately needed for another five years. He could have done what Starmer did but his ‘principles’ were more important than the well being of the electorate. I resigned my Labour membership after that elevation in disgust and have only just come back.

An interesting point. The LibDems have long campaigned for PR but in fact did well under FPTP on Thursday.

I would be keen to know if they still support PR now or only when it suits them.

I hate the bloody word mandate as it's been so misused by politicians to force things through that don't actually accurately reflect public opinion.

On this case, I think Labour have the majority of seats but they don't have a mandate.

They have just 33% of the popular vote. That doesn't really constituent a clear mandate unless you are trying to push a propaganda line about winning.

The way the votes have gone the only true mission they have is to restore public trust in politicians and to try undo a lot of the economic hardship people are facing.

There isn't enthusiasm for Starmer nor for Labours policies compared to the last election.

In UK politics it's always about the next election and trying to get reelected. If Labour want to be reelected (and they do), their primary objectives now have to be fixing issues which are producing concern across the political spectrum. Some of those which are deemed 'more progressive' they would be wise to kick into the long grass and think about doing in a second term if they really believe in them otherwise they risk them being a source of a backlash and a rolling back on rights across the board in 5 years time.

They must tread carefully and not get carried away with that majority.

I might also add that Johnson has a large majority but couldn't pass a bunch of laws because of internal party fighting. I would be incredibly surprised if Starmer didnt have similar issues tbh. Johnson also tried to push policies through which were never going to survive contact with reality and arguably his failure to deliver has come back to haunt Sunak. Sunak himself has been criticised for not being decisive enough. Mays failing was trying to make a political fudge work and therefore pleasing no one. And Truss just lost everyone by attempting to do something utterly ridiculous she was warned against. Starmer potentially has issues with policies that are going to haunt him and a reputation already of being Mr FlipFlop, he by nature seems to be a fudger and he's being warned strongly about particular policies.

The words Rock and Hard Place spring to mind here. He's almost fighting the tide of political polarisation that's international and that's going to be hard to ignore.

They did well but stil ended up with a smaller % of the seats than their percentage of the vote. They got 12.2% of the vote but only 10.9% of the seats.

I don’t think their position on PR is likely to change.

I would imagine they probably do. Its a pretty central plank of theirs, and they usually do badly from FPTP. The Lib Dem argument from self interest is still PR, despite this quite unusual result.

If Labour, Lib Dems or even the Greens stood aside then the right wing press like the Torygraph would have a field day. They would call the election unconstitutional and it's possible Tory activists would find away to make a police investigation or legal challenge like they did over Beergate and Rayner's home. So parties had to leave their candidates to stand.

However it didn't mean the third and fourth parties to the Tories bothered campaigning in many constituencies. So it meant in my area where it is a fight between Lib Dem and Tory, I got absolutely no campaign literature from the Greens or Labour. Friends of mine who live in a couple of party leaders constituencies got party literature from all parties standing and doorstep canvassing by at least two parties.

Carol Voderman's supported tactical voting website and other tactical voting sides made it clear to many tactical voters who to vote for. In fact she said in places like Surrey Heath, Gove's former constituency, they got lots of postcode hits. However in some areas due to the demographics of the constituency voters could not be directed to vote Labour, Lib Dem or even Green to oust the Tories.

Starmer, if he proves that Tory fearmongering is just that, will win back voters from both Reform and the Conservatives.

These are proven voters who turn out.

Leaning left economically I think is ok. The number of high earners I've heard who previously have said about taxes being an issue for them widely seem to accept there will have to be changes to tax even though they don't like that. They will pay more provided they perceive it to be fairer and working. That's a big shift.

Where there is more of an issue is on social issues. The UK is more socially conservative than is given credit. They will tolerate different as long as it's not framed in a way that's forced on them. The British public do not respond well to forced ideas (hence why lockdowns only worked to a point and were particularly hated by lower social statuses as a power imposed from above). The British public respond well to consensus building and demonstration that there's no problem. The majority of the UK public has been brought around to accept homosexually by soft campaigning and trust building over time. This is fragile though and trying to force too hard doesn't work.

This is a fair point, and one I hadn't considered. Thursday night was cathartic in a way that it wouldn't have been in a PR system.

I was the same. I voted for Labour in both 2017 and 2019, as an attempt to stop a hard Brexit. It wasn't about Corbyn at all, I couldn't stand him.

Both those elections were about Brexit rather than about the party leaders.