Praise for Previous Editions 'The Bible of General Elections' —David

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Praise for previous editions

‘The Bible of General Elections’ —David Dimbleby, BBC

‘It’s popular academic writing at its best, combining a clear narrative (using anecdotes and quotes garnered from more than 300 background interviews) with lots of solid, meaty number-crunching’ —The Guardian

‘Dennis Kavanagh and Philip Cowley have penned a political thriller … The book is distinguished by the quality of its sources: the ministers, aides and strategists who open up to these academics in a way they might not to journalists’ —The Observer

‘Indispensable’ —Matthew d’Ancona, Daily Telegraph

‘If you want real insight into the last election, Kavanagh and Cowley look like they’re on the money’ —London Evening Standard

‘The quality of the analysis is as sharp as ever’ —Fabian Review

‘… a riveting read … this is easily the best political book of the year’ —PoliticalBetting.com

‘The studies have become by now almost part of our democratic fabric’ —The Listener

‘The best series anywhere on national elections’ —Annals of American Academy of Political and Social Science Other books in this series THE BRITISH GENERAL ELECTION OF 1945 R. B. McCallum and Alison Readman THE BRITISH GENERAL ELECTION OF 1950 H. G. Nicholas THE BRITISH GENERAL ELECTION OF 1951 David Butler THE BRITISH GENERAL ELECTION OF 1955 David Butler THE BRITISH GENERAL ELECTION OF 1959 David Butler and Richard Rose THE BRITISH GENERAL ELECTION OF 1964 David Butler and Anthony King THE BRITISH GENERAL ELECTION OF 1966 David Butler and Anthony King THE BRITISH GENERAL ELECTION OF 1970 David Butler and Michael Pinto-Duschinsky THE BRITISH GENERAL ELECTION OF FEBRUARY 1974 David Butler and Dennis Kavanagh THE BRITISH GENERAL ELECTION OF OCTOBER 1974 David Butler and Dennis Kavanagh THE BRITISH GENERAL ELECTION OF 1979 David Butler and Dennis Kavanagh THE BRITISH GENERAL ELECTION OF 1983 David Butler and Dennis Kavanagh THE BRITISH GENERAL ELECTION OF 1987 David Butler and Dennis Kavanagh THE BRITISH GENERAL ELECTION OF 1992 David Butler and Dennis Kavanagh THE BRITISH GENERAL ELECTION OF 1997 David Butler and Dennis Kavanagh THE BRITISH GENERAL ELECTION OF 2001 David Butler and Dennis Kavanagh THE BRITISH GENERAL ELECTION OF 2005 Dennis Kavanagh and David Butler THE BRITISH GENERAL ELECTION OF 2010 Dennis Kavanagh and Philip Cowley THE BRITISH GENERAL ELECTION OF 2015 Philip Cowley and Dennis Kavanagh Philip Cowley • Dennis Kavanagh The British General Election of 2017 Philip Cowley Dennis Kavanagh Queen Mary University of London University of Liverpool London, UK Liverpool, UK

ISBN 978-3-319-95935-1 ISBN 978-3-319-95936-8 (eBook) https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-95936-8

Library of Congress Control Number: 2018952784

© The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s) 2018 This work is subject to copyright. All rights are solely and exclusively licensed by the Publisher, whether the whole or part of the material is concerned, specifically the rights of translation, reprinting, reuse of illustrations, recitation, broadcasting, reproduction on microfilms or in any other physical way, and transmission or information storage and retrieval, electronic adaptation, computer software, or by similar or dissimilar methodology now known or hereafter developed. The use of general descriptive names, registered names, trademarks, service marks, etc. in this publication does not imply, even in the absence of a specific statement, that such names are exempt from the relevant protective laws and regulations and therefore free for general use. The publisher, the authors, and the editors are safe to assume that the advice and information in this book are believed to be true and accurate at the date of publication. Neither the publisher nor the authors or the editors give a warranty, express or implied, with respect to the material contained herein or for any errors or omissions that may have been made. The publisher remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institu- tional affiliations.

Front cover credit: Bloomberg / Contributor Back cover credit: Ian Forsyth / Stringer

This Palgrave Macmillan imprint is published by the registered company Springer Nature Switzerland AG The registered company address is: Gewerbestrasse 11, 6330 Cham, Switzerland Preface

This volume is the twentieth in a series of books which originated in 1945 in Nuffield College, Oxford. The first volume in the series was the result of Ronald McCallum’s frustration with what he saw as the constant misinterpretation of the 1918 election; he wanted to place on record the events of the 1945 contest before similar myths took root. It began what is now the longest-running national election series in the world. This is the third volume in the series where neither of the authors is based at Nuffield, but our aim remains the same: to create an accurate and, as far as possible, impartial account and explanation of the general election. In the introduction to the 1945 volume, McCallum and his co-author Alison Readman began with the Duke of Wellington’s observation that you could no more describe a battle than you could describe a ballroom. ‘Still less’, they remarked, ‘can you describe a general election.’ The only thing they said that was certain about a general election was: ‘It is not simple.’ Their comments certainly apply to the 2017 contest, which was a particularly difficult election to write about. Once an election is over and it is possible to talk openly with the participants, it is usually the case that for all the complexity in any election, there is a broad consensus about what happened. For the most part, Labour staffers and politicians agree with their rival counterparts about why one campaign struggled and why the other succeeded. There are nuances and differences—sometimes genuine, and a result of the different perspectives of participants, sometimes driven by self-interest or partisanship—but these are often quite marginal. When it comes to the fundamentals, there is normally little disagreement.

v vi PREFACE

This was not true this time. Once we move beyond the merely descriptive—that is, the Conservatives had a huge opinion poll lead, which they proceeded to lose—there is little consensus about what happened in the 2017 general election or, at least, why it happened. Perhaps most striking of all, there is no intra-party consensus on these questions. There are at least two versions of the Labour campaign, both passionately believed, along with a similar number of views of the Conservative campaign. During interviews, the phrases used by insiders about supposed comrades or colleagues were often much cruder, and more industrial, than those about their supposed opponents. Much remains contested. For example, below, we report the claim that at various points during his leadership, Jeremy Corbyn ‘wobbled’. Any wobbles would have been understandable. Leadership was not a position he had ever expected to hold. He had faced repeated—and often brutal— criticism. (Which of us, under similar conditions, would not have won- dered whether this was the game for us?) Some of these accounts have Corbyn in tears, with members of his family telling him that it is not worth it, while some of his aides tell him that he must hang on for the good of the left. Yet members of his key team vehemently deny that any of this ever happened. Something similar applies to Theresa May on the night of the election, once the result of the election became clear. Did she wobble? Again, it would be understandable. She had called an election, run on a hugely personalised campaign, in which she had been front and centre, and squandered an enormous opinion poll lead. (Which of us, under similar conditions, would not have considered throwing in the towel?) There are multiple claims that she came close to resigning on the night of the election—although these claims vary hugely depending on who is recount- ing them—but again the official line remains that she did not do so. Similar differences, more trivial perhaps but just as frustrating for those attempt- ing to chronicle the contest, attach to many key moments in the campaign. As will become clear, in what follows, the snap nature of the contest presented problems for all of the parties (ironically, perhaps, the Conservatives most of all) but it also made life harder for us as authors. Normally with a book like this, much of the preparation—drafting, data collection, background interviews and so on—is carried out in the run-up to the election. After the Prime Minister’s shock announcement on 18 April 2017, we started with a blank page. The same goes for our contribu- tors, all of whom did not expect to be spending much of 2017 writing PREFACE vii about a general election. We owe them a huge debt for meeting demanding deadlines and repeated editorial requests. In addition to writing Appendix 1, John Curtice, Stephen Fisher, Robert Ford and Patrick English also supplied the data from which Appendix 2 has been compiled. Yet despite all the hard work, it was a fascinating election to write about. Both the decision to call the 2017 election and the eventual outcome can fairly be described as surprises, but then they were merely the latest surprises to hit British politics. Since the 2015 contest (the result of which was itself a surprise), Jeremy Corbyn became Labour leader, Britain voted to leave the European Union, the Prime Minister resigned after a year in office as head of a majority government, and a year later his successor— having repeatedly declared she would not do so—called another general election in search of a bigger majority of seats, which she then failed to achieve, despite seemingly being on course for a landslide. The dramatis personae of the 2017 election were very different from those of 2015. In our last volume, Jeremy Corbyn did not feature—other than, at the end of the book, to note his election as Labour leader. John McDonnell did not feature at all. The pair might, perhaps, have been worth a mention for their promise to make life difficult for an incoming Miliband government from the backbenches. But this all seemed too trivial, the pair too far removed from power. Yet within months, they were transforming the Labour Party. Even Theresa May received only a handful of passing mentions in the 2015 volume; she may have been Home Secretary, but when it came to the election, she was a bit player at most. Corbyn’s elevation to the Labour leadership tested many well- established assumptions about British political parties. Could a party in Parliament have a leader who had so little support among his MPs? Could a party thrive when there was such a gap between the views of the mass membership and its MPs? Could a leader survive a decisive vote of no confidence by his colleagues? And, when the election was called, could a party do well in a general election fighting on a left-of-centre manifesto? The answers were more positive than many would have thought. In writing this book, we were helped, as always, by the very generous support of many of the participants. We spoke to hundreds of people from the different parties and we are very grateful for the time they gave us. We deliberately do not list them here, as many spoke to us on the condition of strict confidentiality, but we hope they will recognise the picture we paint—although we know that not all will agree with our conclusions. Unsourced information or quotations in the following text are taken from viii PREFACE these interviews, unless otherwise indicated. Many also agreed to look at draft chapters, helping to suggest improvements and challenging our judgements, and again we are very grateful, as we are to the many friends and colleagues who also read early drafts of the book or helped with que- ries. These include Caitlin Milazzo, Chris Prosser, Jon Mellon, Paula Surridge, Ross Hawkins, David Cowling, Monica Poletti, Ben Worthy, Jane Green, Peter Kellner, Colin Rallings, Richard McKay, Alia Middleton, Peter Geoghegan, Matthew Shaddick, Richard Kelly, Justin Fisher, Will Jennings, Mark Pickup, Matthew Bailey, Mark Byrne, Roger Scully, Mark Stuart, Tim Bale, Jon Tonge, Joe Twyman, Paul Webb and Roger Mortimore. We are especially indebted to Wes Ball, who worked as a researcher, as well as co-writing Chapter 8. Lizzy Adam and Mercy Muroki also provided research assistance. The British Academy generously provided funding (BA Special Project 2017/1). We were aided by the excellent volumes already published on, or which covered, the election. These included Tim Shipman’s Fall Out, Tim Ross and Tom McTague’s Betting the House and Jon Tonge et al.’s edited collection Britain Votes 2017. We differ from them in interpretation in some places and very occasionally in matters of fact. Responsibility for any remaining errors rests with us alone. We are indebted to all those who supplied or allowed us to reproduce material. The political parties all generously allowed us to reproduce campaign posters or images. Martin Rowson, Steve Bell, Ben Jennings and the Telegraph Media Group (for Adams, Matt and Bob) and News UK (for Peter Brookes, Morten Morland and Steve Bright) granted us permission to print their excellent cartoons. The majority of photos in the plates come courtesy of either Getty or Alamy, although other pictures, some of them thanks to the now-ubiquitous camera phone, come from Bruce Cutts/ The After Alice Project, Ned Simons, Iain McNicol, Richard Cracknell, Tori Cowley and Freida Moore. The picture of the Lib Debate rehearsal on p. 210 comes from someone who would prefer to remain anonymous. The Polling Observatory team allowed us to reproduce the graphs in chapters 1 and 16. We are grateful to all of them. This book follows the broad structure of the previous volumes in the series, but each election is different, so we have included separate chapters specifically on Brexit and the decision to call the election. The long campaign—the longest and most consequential of modern British politics— has resulted in three chapters. Like most of its predecessors, our story ends PREFACE ix with the announcement of the result, and only briefly covers the process of formation of the government. The team at Palgrave Macmillan have been supportive and encourag- ing, and have allowed us to tell what we think is a fascinating story.

London, UK Philip Cowley Liverpool, UK Dennis Kavanagh May 2018 Contents

1 Not Going According to Plan 1

2 Brexit 21 Jack Glynn and Anand Menon

3 From Stockbroker’s Son to Vicar’s Daughter: The Conservatives 41

4 From Miliband to Corbyn: Labour 67

5 The Liberal Democrats and Others 99

6 Still Different, Only Slightly Less So: Scotland 125 Gerry Hassan

7 Towards a Landslide 149

8 Everything Changes 177 With Wes Ball

xi xii Contents

9 Horrors and Hopes 203

10 Election Night and Its Aftermath 231

11 Wrong-Footed Again: The Polls 259

12 Targeted (and Untargeted) Local Campaigning 285

13 Campaign Coverage and Editorial Judgements: Broadcasting 323 Stephen Cushion and Charlie Beckett

14 A Bad Press: Newspapers 347 Dominic Wring and David Deacon

15 Political Recruitment Under Pressure: MPs and Candidates 385 Rosie Campbell and Jennifer Hudson

16 The Election in Retrospect 409

Appendix 1: The Results Analysed 449 John Curtice, Stephen Fisher, Robert Ford and Patrick English

Appendix 2: The Voting Statistics 496

Appendix 3: Select Political Chronology 2015–17 537

Index 549 List of Figures and Box

Figure 1.1 Estimated party vote intention, May 2015–April 2017 15 Figure 11.1 Estimated party vote intention, May 2015–June 2017 263 Figure A1.1 Change in UKIP share of the vote in England and Wales, 2015–17, by UKIP share of the vote, 2015 473 Figure A1.2 Change in Green share of the vote in England and Wales, 2015–17, by Green share of the vote, 2015 (excluding Brighton Pavilion) 476

Box 1.1 Plan B 13

xiii List of Tables

Table 6.1 Yes and No supporters by party vote 2015–2017 134 Table 6.2 Do you think Nicola Sturgeon is doing well or badly as First Minister? 139 Table 6.3 Do you think Ruth Davidson is doing well or badly as leader of the Scottish Conservative Party? 140 Table 11.1 Final polls by BPC companies 270 Table 11.2 Record of exit poll seat predictions 2005–2017 272 Table 12.1 Types of voter contact during the campaign 301 Table 12.2 Political activities by voters during the campaign 313 Table 13.1 Proportion of news about the 2015 and 2017 general election campaigns 325 Table 13.2 Proportion of lead election news items in the 2015 and 2017 general election campaigns 325 Table 13.3 Top ten subjects in election news 326 Table 13.4 Proportion of policy versus process news in the 2017 election campaign 328 Table 13.5 Level of policy information in the 2017 election coverage 329 Table 13.6 The main televised leaders’ debates/election programmes during the 2017 general election campaign 331 Table 13.7 The questions asked in the main televised leaders’ debates/ election programmes during the 2017 UK general election campaign 336 Table 13.8 Share of party political airtime on UK television news evening bulletins 337 Table 13.9 Share of party leaders’ airtime on UK television news 339

xv xvi List of Tables

Table 14.1 Daily newspapers’ partisanship and circulation 349 Table 14.2 Sunday newspapers’ partisanship and circulation 351 Table 14.3 Front-page lead stories, 19 April–8 June 352 Table 14.4 Campaign issues: top ten in the press 375 Table 15.1 The number (and percentage) of women elected by party in 2015 and 2017 395 Table 15.2 2017 MPs by year first elected and party 397 Table 15.3 MPs’ ages by party 398 Table 15.4 Candidates’ school type 399 Table 15.5 Candidates’ highest educational qualification 400 Table 15.6 2017 MPs’ occupation immediately prior to the election 401 Table 16.1 Stories the public noticed 412 Table 16.2 The most capable Prime Minister 413 Table 16.3 How Britain voted in 2017 420 Table 16.4 Preferred party on issues 424 Table 16.5 Alternative projections of the 2017 election 440 Table A1.1 Measures of change since 2015 451 Table A1.2 Change in Conservative and Labour share of the vote 2015–17 by 2016 Leave vote 453 Table A1.3 Change in Conservative and Labour share of the vote 2015–17 by 2016 Leave vote and drop in UKIP vote 2015–17 455 Table A1.4 Change in Conservative and Labour support 2015–17 by percentage without any educational qualifications and percentage aged 18–24 457 Table A1.5 Change in Liberal Democrat share of the vote 2015–17 by proportion of graduates and EU referendum vote 462 Table A1.6 Change in Liberal Democrat share of the vote 2015–17 by status of Liberal Democrat candidate and the Liberal Democrats’ principal challenger 464 Table A1.7 Mean change in parties’ share of the vote 2015–17 by status of Liberal Democrat candidate and the Liberal Democrats’ principal challenger 465 Table A1.8 UKIP share of the vote in England and Wales, 2010, 2015 and 2017 by Leave vote 2016, winning party 2010, proportion with no qualifications and proportion in routine manual occupations 474 Table A1.9 Relationship between votes and seats following the 2017 election 487 Table A2.1 Votes and seats, 1945–2017 496 Table A2.2 Party performance (UK) 498 List of Tables xvii

Table A2.3 Party performance (Northern Ireland) 499 Table A2.4 National and regional results 500 Table A2.5 Constituency results 503 Table A2.6 Seats changing hands 528 Table A2.7 Exceptional results 529 Table A2.8 By-election results, 2015–17 535 Lists of Illustrations

Photographs

The press reaction, 19 April. Credit: Lenscap/Alamy Stock Photo 2 Liberal Democrat manifesto launch podium. Credit: Ned Simons 194 Liberal Democrat debate rehearsal, Ministry of Sound, 29 May 210 Polling station sign, London. Credit: Richard Cracknell 234 #dogsatpollingstations. Credit: Freida Moore 236 Labour Gains board, Southside. Credit: Iain McNicol 238

Party Advertisements

Strong and stable leadership [Conservative Party] 6 REVEALED: Tories admit they DON’T care about immigration numbers [UKIP] 107 A Green MP will never support a Tory government [Green] 112 The not so secret life of 5 year old politicians [Green] 114 There’s only one Leader you can really trust [Plaid Cymru] 115 Dis May [SNP] 132 Conservative attack ads [Conservative Party] 156 Labour policy ads [Labour] 181 Cross here [Liberal Democrat] 192 Breakfast clearly doesn’t mean breakfast [Liberal Democrat] 211 Because your children deserve worse [Momentum] 289

xix xx Lists of Illustrations

Cartoons

‘We have to stop meeting like this’ [Matt, Daily Telegraph, 19 April 2017] © Matt/Telegraph Media Group Ltd 8 ‘Bring it on!’ [Peter Brookes, The Times, 20 April 2017] © News UK/News Licensing 11 Tug of war [Morten Morland, The Times, 15 June 2016] © News UK/News Licensing 28 ‘Let’s never ask the public for their views ever again’ [Matt, Daily Telegraph, 26 June 2016] © Matt/Telegraph Media Group Ltd 32 EU Referendum 2016 [Steve Bell, The Guardian, 3 February 2016] © Steve Bell 43 Red Carpet Treatment… [Peter Brookes, The Times, 12 July 2016] © News UK/News Licensing 46 ‘Thank you for resigning from the shadow cabinet…’ [Matt, Daily Telegraph, 28 June 2016] © Matt/Telegraph Media Group Ltd 82 When the punchbag is victorious [Moran, Daily Telegraph, 25 September 2016] © Bob Moran/Telegraph Media Group Ltd 86 ‘Don’t go all wobbly on me, Tim!’ [Peter Brookes, The Times, 26 April 2017] © News UK/News Licensing 101 ‘The party is divided. The loonies may split from the fruitcakes’ [Matt, Daily Telegraph, 17 September 2016] © Matt/Telegraph Media Group Ltd 110 ‘Don’t just hope for a scottier Scotland, vote for one’ [Steve Bell, The Guardian, 3 May 2016] © Steve Bell 127 ‘Having a referendum to leave the union would be divisive…’ [Adams, Daily Telegraph, 28 March 2017] © Adams/Telegraph Media Group Ltd 129 ‘The tortoise always wins!’ [Moran, Daily Telegraph, 22 April 2017] © Bob Moran/Telegraph Media Group Ltd 150 ‘Bring it on’ [Adams, Daily Telegraph, 19 April 2017] © Adams/Telegraph Media Group Ltd 153 After ‘Being John Malkovich’ [Ben Jennings, The Guardian, 30 May 2017] © Ben Jennings 178 In the Victory Bunker [Martin Rowson, The Guardian, 21 May 2017] © Martin Rowson 186 ‘If…’ [Steve Bell, The Guardian, 8 June 2017] © Steve Bell 187 Lists of Illustrations xxi

‘Bah!’ [Ben Jennings, i, 27 May 2017] © Ben Jennings 204 ‘She can’t meet anyone…’ [Martin Rowson, Daily Mirror, 15 May 2017] © Martin Rowson 207 Behind the sofa [Peter Brookes, The Times, 1 June 2017] © News UK/News Licensing 213 Winner’s Rostrum [Martin Rowson, Chartist Magazine, 25 June 2017] © Martin Rowson 239 ‘My Dad’s an opinion pollster…’ [Matt, Daily Telegraph, 8 June 2017] © Matt/Telegraph Media Group Ltd 260 ‘He spent 20 minutes…’ [Matt, Daily Telegraph, 23 April 2017] © Matt/Telegraph Media Group Ltd 286 ‘Un10able!’ [Steve Bright, Sun, 12 June 2017] © News UK/News Licensing 410 ‘Jeremy Corbyn… will find himself…’ [Steve Bell,The Guardian, 31 May 2017] © Steve Bell 414 ‘It turns out the voters are bloody difficult as well’ [Matt, Daily Telegraph, 9 June 2017] © Matt/Telegraph Media Group Ltd 418 Theresa May announces the election outside Number 10, 18 April. © Xinhua/ Alamy Stock Photo

Jeremy Corbyn campaigning in Cardiff. © Andrew Bartlett/Alamy Stock Photo Tim Farron and the Lib Dem campaign bus. © Bettina Strenske/Alamy Stock Photo

Nicola Sturgeon launching the SNP’s manifesto. © Steven Scott Taylor/Alamy Stock Photo Paul Nutall launching UKIP’s immigration policy. © Vickie Flores/ Alamy Stock Photo

Caroline Lucas launching the Green Party’s environment manifesto. © Mark Kerrison/Alamy Stock Photo Leanne Wood campaigning for Plaid Cymru in Rhondda Cynon Taf. © Matthew Horwood/Alamy Stock Photo

Ruth Davidson speaking at the launch of the Scottish Conservative manifesto. © Steven Scott Taylor/Alamy Stock Photo Jeremy Corbyn arriving at the ITV studios, flanked by Seumas Milne (l) and James Schneider (r). © Tommy London/Alamy Stock Photo

Nick Timothy and Fiona Hill outside Conservative Campaign Headquarters. © Chris J Ratcliffe/Stringer Jim Messina (l), Lynton Crosby (c), and Mark Textor (r). © Barcroft Media/ Contributor

Andrew Gwynne (l) and Ian Lavery (r). © Stephen Chung/Alamy Stock Photo John McDonnell speaking at the Museum of London. © Matthew Chattle/Alamy Stock Photo

Theresa May speaking in Edinburgh, at a removals company. © Steven Scott Taylor/Alamy Stock Photo A Corbyn crowd, in Hebden Bridge. © Bruce Cutts/The After Alice Project

The Shadow Cabinet watch on as Jeremy Corbyn launches the Labour manifesto. © Leon Neal/Getty Images Corbyn support in Norwich. © John Birdsall/Alamy Stock Photo

The Maidenhead declaration. © Mark Kerrison/Alamy Stock Photo Iain McNicol (l) and Karie Murphy (r), with Jeremy Corbyn at Labour HQ, the day after the election. © amer ghazzal/Alamy Stock Photo

Arlene Foster and Nigel Dodds visit Number 10 for talks, 13 June. © WENN Ltd/Alamy Stock Photo Anti-DUP protest. © Matthew Chattle/Alamy Stock Photo

Signing of the DUP-Conservative deal, 26 June. Seated: Jeffrey Donaldson (l) and Gavin Williamson (r). Standing, from left to right: Nigel Dodds, Arlene Foster, Theresa May, Damian Green. © WPA Pool/Getty