In Britain, There's A Lot To Get Done

Boris Johnson’s Brexit slogan has won him a majority, but the road ahead is full of challenges

- Andrew Whitehead

Brexit is the “irrefutable, irresistible, unarguable decision of the British people,” declared Boris Johnson in the wake of his emphatic election victory. ‘Get Brexit Done’ was the campaign slogan of his Conservative Party — and it delivered.

Three and a half years after the referendum in which voters decided to leave the European Union, many were fed up with the delay, division, and confusion which shrouded British politics. Mr. Johnson now has an 80-seat majority in Parliament — a very comfortable margin which means he will be able to deliver on his pledge to take Britain out of the EU at the end of January. The Conservatives have won on a scale last seen in the Thatcher era of the 1980s. On the other hand, the opposition Labour Party has endured a truly awful result — its worst election performance since the 1930s. In spite of the drift of the two main parties to what were once the margins of mainstream politics, the smaller parties, with the conspicuous exception of the Scottish nationalists, have made little impact. The election exposed, in the words of the leading historian Peter Hennessy, the “howling void” in the center-ground of British politics.

Moving from left to right

Drilling down into the detailed pattern of voting, the crucial seats which swung from Labour to Conservative were in the post-industrial north and midlands of England. These are sometimes described as ‘left behind’ areas, where many of the skilled blue-collar jobs have gone and the high streets are blighted by closed shops and empty business premises. Voters in these towns and cities tilted the outcome of the EU referendum towards ‘leave’ in 2016 and they have now once again made the political weather.