General Election Looming

Tactical Voting – Will it happen for real?

If you look at opinion polls you’d think with the Tories being so unpopular that Labour and Lib Dem voters would size up each constituency, decided who is most likely to beat sitting Tory MP’s and get on with it, but things are not so straight forward in the real world.

Firstly, you have to have an understanding of the constituency you live in as it’s the only place that matters when casting your vote. Seeing Labour so far in front in the national polls and then blindly voting Labour thinking it will change things in your seat may well be exactly what keeps a Tory MP their seat! Look at it this way if Labour are usually in 3^rd place in your constituency then blindly voting for them to win may just split the anti-Tory vote enough to actually assist your beleaguered Tory MP. If the Lib Dems are usually 2^nd or have previously beaten the Tory in your seat then voting for them is probably the best option if you want the Tory MP out.

But do voters know enough about their own constituency to make a reasoned informed decision, if their main objective is to get a sitting Tory MP out? The national polls won’t help them so where do they get clear independent and easily accessible information about what’s the best way to vote in their particular seat?

Even if you get that far there are other factors in play. Some tribal Labour supporters will not vote Lib Dem even to get a Tory MP out despite the Lib Dems being to the left of Labour these days. Many working-class identifying Labour supporters are quite right-wing in their opinions, many supported Brexit and some broke a habit of a lifetime to help deliver Boris Johnson as PM! So don’t assume all or even a majority of Labour supporters are progressives and left of centre as many are not and in that case the Tories will in effect be their 2^nd choice, strange as that may seem. And this very factor is, of course, why Starmer puts forward a right of centre pitch to voters. His objective is to get his right-wingers back in his tent; anything else is secondary to this.

Then look at Lib Dem supporters. How many of them will vote for Starmer’s Labour Party which they may well see as being right of centre? Asking progressives to vote Labour if they are not habitual Labour voters may be an ask too far, but they may do it as a one off. However, to persuade them Starmer really needs to be offering proportional representation (to stop the Tories swinging back into power), to re-join the Customs Union, Single Market and ultimately the EU (to boost our economy), to save the NHS from more damaging privatisation etc. etc. Of course, Labour are not offering such things so progressives are at best sceptical of voting Labour.

Then there’s the Green vote which of recent years is significantly a socialist-biased one as the Greens have become home to those leaving or being chucked out of Starmer’s right of centre party. Asking them to vote Labour will be a big ask but maybe not as difficult for them to vote Lib Dem?

And the above issues are just with regard to England as Wales and Scotland effectively have a 5-way split political system with the added complexity that brings.

Let’s now look at what right of centre voters will do. Of course, they’ve all pretty much voted Tory for generations but UKIP started to change that. The present day Tory Party is in effect UKIP by another name but we have an even more right wing party in Reform.

If Reform stands against most or all of the presently sitting Tory MP’s then our first past the post electoral system could all but ensure the Tories are wiped out. But will Reform stand in large numbers or will the Tories find a way of buying them off? Even if they do stand pretty much everywhere to what extent will the right wing vote be split? Please bear in mind that a not insignificant part of that vote will go to Starmer’s party if he is successful at regaining Labour’s lost voters who delivered Brexit and Johnson. The question therefore is to what extent will right of centre voters be voting tactically too?

All this convoluted political carry on is because our warped electoral system often forces voters to put an ‘X’ next to their least worst political option on ballot papers. If only we could just vote for the party we genuinely supported! That would take PR of course, so go figure what you’re going to do tactically as presently your choices are limited and not necessarily straight forward either.