| 6 mins read
The 2024 general election and the newly elected Parliament break a number of historical records. Sadly, the lowest turnout of any general election since 2001 is not a record of which we should be proud. On the more positive side, we have the most ethnically diverse Parliament we have ever had with more women MPs than ever. The election also broke records for the worst result for the Conservative party and the highest number of seats for the Liberal Democrats. We also have the largest number of elected independent MPs, and record numbers of MPs from the Green Party and Reform. The 2024 election also saw the fewest votes cast for the Labour and Conservatives combined in any general election since the second world war and the lowest ever share of the vote for a majority-winning party.
Unsurprisingly, the main story emerging from the election is therefore the fragmentation of the party system. With so few voters considering themselves loyal party identifiers, and so many having switched parties not once, but twice since 2015, it is natural that many think our electoral system no longer delivers what it has done for decades: a nearly two-party system.
However, when we talk about the electorate in 2024 election being fragmented, we need to be careful in hailing this as an entirely new, or permanent change. While we wait for more in-depth analyses with individual-level, scholarly data, there are some initial reasons why we should exercise caution.
First, it is very unusual for an all-change election to have such a low turnout. It is very telling that a previous general election with a comparably low turnout was the 2001 election. In 2001, everyone expected Labour to sail into their second term without trouble; the Conservative party was largely in post-1997 disarray, still licking their wounds from losing power.
What might have caused such low levels of turnout in this year’s election, which promised a change in government for the first time in four elections? It may have been the overwhelming polling lead that Labour had been posting since May, when the election was called. Evidence indicates that very high leads in polls depress turnout, as voters correctly think that their individual vote will change little in the face of such popular front-runner.
However, an overwhelming lead also suggests to voters – especially in the context of the first past the post voting system – that where majorities are large, casting their votes elsewhere will not hurt the leading party’s chances of winning overall. This is a sort of reverse tactical voting to which we are rarely exposed in general elections. In the usual tactical voting scenario each voter considers voting for a party that they do not actually prefer, just to keep another party out of government. In the reverse, the voter is certain that their least preferred party will lose anyway, and thus they can afford to vote for a third or fourth party.
Sometimes this kind of vote could be used to signal to the two main parties what the voter’s preferences on certain issues are. Sometimes, it is a purely expressive vote, whereby a voter actually votes for a party they truly prefer, whatever their chances of winning. Usually, this kind of voting takes place in second order elections, not general elections. In fact, after the 2016 Brexit referendum this happened in UK’s very last elections to the European Parliament, where both main parties came third and fifth.
It is therefore possible that with a Conservative loss and Labour win looking so probable, voters simply voted as they did in local elections: for third parties and independents?
Another clue that this kind of reverse tactical voting may have been behind Labour’s lower than expected share of the vote is that their poll lead starting to fall only very close to the election (despite the lack of any obvious campaign disasters this late in the day), and their vote share fell the most in areas where they were strongest. This suggests that many of their traditionally core voters used what they felt was a relatively safe opportunity to support other parties. That for the liberal young it was the Green party, and for the older voters from more deprived areas it was Reform, again runs consistent with this logic: with each of the groups sending a message to Labour on their preferred policy issue.
However, would such a pattern of voting, and this degree of fragmentation survive a more uncertain election with the two main parties closer in the polls? Ultimately, in our voting system, voters vote to keep parties to account. In practise, it means getting rid of unpopular government and letting the opposition have a go. With the 2024 election being such a foregone conclusion, voters perhaps felt more freedom to use their vote in a different way. Therefore, despite most pundits hailing 2024 as a return of competence elections, with economic performance once again at the forefront of the competition between parties, many voters might have still voted on the identity issues they spent the last decade caring about.
