British elections... facts behind the numbers

Thanks to the development of statistics and opinion polls, what was expected came true, and yesterday, the British Labor Party snatched a huge electoral victory that ended 14 consecutive years of Conservative Party rule.

For some time now, the outcome of the snap elections called by Rishi Sunak, the Prime Minister, has been in doubt. Indeed, there are those who say that Sunak’s haste to implement it is due to his realization of the absurdity of stalling, running forward, and waiting for relief that will not come, while the biddings of the demagogues of the isolationist Reform Party are increasing, and the new moderate leadership of the Labor Party is “arranging” the conditions for its coexistence with the establishment of power and the “deep state.” After turning the page on the previous radical leadership.

Sunak felt deep down that his party had nothing more to offer except more absurd tax bribes and internal conflicts over fragile leadership that resulted in four prime ministers in five years.

According to the logic of things, in a country with established traditions like Britain, the man realized that the “deep state” and its institutions were no longer betting on his exhausted party, but rather welcomed new blood that could serve its interests for a longer period and with a stronger popular mandate. Perhaps the clearest evidence of this is the public shift in the positions of some right-wing tabloids to support the “workers” in recent weeks.

This development has been experienced by the British before, when they were tired of the long years of the “Thatcherite era” (18 years, including the years of John Major) between 1979 and 1997, and the laxity of its authority, in exchange for the rise of a workers’ alternative that set its sights on the goals of removing leftist activists and weakening extremist trade unionists. And coexistence with the private sector and local and global capitalism.

Indeed, in early May 1997, Tony Blair led the “New” Labor Party to a sweeping victory in which it won more than 43 percent of the votes and a majority of 178 seats.

What happened yesterday was "close"; People were also tired of the problems of the last 14 years, while there was a moderate labor alternative that toppled its leftists and pushed them away. The result was the abandonment and downfall of the conservatives. Here I deliberately used the word “almost” and not “similar.” Because there are important differences that may clarify important facts behind the numbers. This is because what happened in the last elections was a bitter defeat for the Conservative Party... rather than a victory for the “workers”.

True, the “workers” won politically, and they will rule over the next four years with a huge, comfortable majority of 172 seats. However, they only obtained 33.7 percent of the votes. This means that their percentage of votes did not increase from what they obtained 4 years ago on the day of their painful defeat under the leadership of Jeremy Corbyn, except by 1.9 percent... and yet they achieved the majority of the huge seats mentioned above.

In my opinion, this can be explained by the following:

1 - After “Labour” overthrew Corbyn’s radical leadership and chose the “moderate” Sir Keir Starmer as the new leader, the Labor Party no longer worried about the “establishment” and the “deep state.” Rather, it was relieved after it had multiple long-term options.

2 - The relationship with Europe has always been a problematic issue within the Conservative Party. Although the moderate wing in favor of harmony with Europe won the round temporarily when Britain joined the European family at the beginning of 1973; The right-wing “Thatcherite movement” within the party has always been against rapprochement and integration. From the womb of this “current”, in particular, the “Brexit” group was born. The irony is that the conservative right met, in terms of interests for Europe, with a radical leftist movement within the Labor Party... that was also against entering a “European common market” under the pretext that it is a “bourgeois bloc” that harms the interests of the working class.

Later, after the success of the advocates of exit following the referendum in 2016, and their fear of a new referendum that would nullify its effects, they founded the “Reform” party, which included the ardent opponents of any return to Europe, and those calling for confronting immigration and asylum seekers.

3 - The “Reform” Party then developed into a polarizing and mobilizing force, with some of its extremists tending to adopt an approach closer to racism and xenophobia than to moderate isolationism. During the period of the "conservatives" floundering in their internal crises in recent years, and the "workers" attacking their leftist movement, the return of "reform" gradually intensified. In the last general election, he received 14 percent of the votes.

4 - In Scotland, the Scottish National Party - due to the failure of its policies and the aggravation of its internal disputes - witnessed a collapse parallel to the collapse of the Conservative Party in England and Wales. Here too the Labor Party, which had always been a major force in Scotland before the rise of the nationalists over the last three decades, benefited.

Thus, we reach two conclusions:

First, it is not accurate to say that “Britain has moved left while most of Europe is moving right.” In fact, British extremism - both right and left - has become so strong and organized that it is no longer forced to hide behind the Conservative Party or the Labor Party. Indeed, the “reform” today reproduces all the similar “literature” of the right in France, Italy, and Germany in this field.

Second, the setback suffered by Scottish nationalists may mean a decline in calls for a new referendum on Scottish independence. For your information, the number of seats for the Nationalists decreased from 48 seats to only 9 seats, while the “workers” increased their number of seats from 2 seats to 37 seats!

Accordingly, the results of the British elections are remarkable, and may temporarily “brake” the acceleration towards extreme right hegemony in Western Europe. But the presence of seeds of xenophobic isolationism means that changes “beneath the surface” may not be reassuring in the foreseeable future.