United Kingdom

Cracks in the ‘blue wall’?

Boris Johnson has had a torrid week. His hosting of the G7 saw pointed remarks from President Biden and continental European leaders about the importance of respecting the Northern Ireland protocol. His former adviser Dominic Cummings, taking revenge for being ousted, publicised further damaging documents in the form of WhatsApp messages from the Prime Minister revealing Johnson’s uncensored views on government and on his colleagues. On top of that, the Liberal Democrats last Thursday delivered him a sensational by-election defeat in a Conservative constituency in South East England normally considered to be part of the ‘blue wall’ Conservative Party heartland. What does that mean for Boris Johnson and his government?

By-election defeats for serving governments are not unusual. Nor are they necessarily significant.  While serving as pressure valves for the release of popular discontent, they rarely change the government. This one may herald a change of mood within government ranks.

A by-election occurs when a sitting MP dies or stands down from Parliament. Mrs Thatcher and her successor suffered many such defeats at a time when the average age of MPs made such contests more likely.  Like his predecessors, Johnson governs through the ‘elective dictatorship’ of the UK’s disproportional parliamentary system with a comfortable majority of votes in Parliament. But the Conservatives only last month pulled off an unexpected by-election success, winning a seat in Labour’s ‘red wall’ heartland in a rare example of a sitting government defeating the opposition. Therefore to lose Chesham and Amersham to the Liberal Democrats – by more than 8,000 votes, on a quite remarkable 25% swing – will dishearten the Prime Minister and his colleagues.

The issues on which the election was decided were numerous, including local and some national planning matters. Liberal Democrat exploitation of local opposition to the construction of a new high-speed railway line through the constituency was depressingly populist, not least because the Party had supported its construction in Parliament. But an over-arching theme was discontent with Brexit. Chickens are coming home to roost.

For Liberal Democrat leader Ed Davey, who has failed thus far – with only 11 MPs – to gain attention in the media, the result is a welcome fillip. The candidate, who won the election, Sarah Green, is a businesswoman and long-time party member, having served the party as a parliamentary researcher. She will make a competent MP, though she will have difficulty holding the seat in a General Election, deprived of the concentration of the Party’s resources which a by-election permits.

For Prime Minister Boris Johnson it can only increase the rumblings of discontent in the Conservative Party about his maverick style of government. It will not escape notice that it is more than 100 years since the Liberal Democrats last had a Member of Parliament in Buckinghamshire. And it will help to sharpen the knives of his nemesis Michael Gove.