Kmflett's Blog

Six Years On: Measuring Labour’s Vote on 12th December 2019

Labour suffered a significant Electoral defeat five years ago on 12th December 2019 while the Tories achieved a large majority, their first for three decades.

Keir Starmer’s constant refrain is that Labour has changed. Indeed many thousands of members have left and the Party has moved rightwards. Labour won the July 2025 General Election mainly it might be ventured because the Tories were a chaotic disaster and Starmer was not in the frame for that. Of course there were other reasons, in particular people wanted some sign of change for the better

The media, which at best, is not great when it comes to history often noted that the 202 seats Labour won was the lowest total since 1935. Of course there are always other figures. One is that Labour after December 2019 had the largest number of female MPs in Parliamentary history.

One interesting measure is the total number of votes  cast for Labour. This (fairly obviously) is not a guarantee of Electoral success, particularly with a first past the post system, but it does in a very broad way reflect a class vote and the depth of a Party’s support. As things have moved on from July 2024 how rooted Labour’s support is, or not, has become increasingly significant

Here Labour’s 2019 vote of 10.3 million was well down on what Corbyn achieved in 2017 but beyond that the second highest Labour total since 2001, Tony Blair’s 2nd Election victory.

Starmer’s references to the 2019 Election, in which he played a key role, may be seen as political theatre, even if he is not exactly the best actor. The reality is however that away from Westminster in workplaces and communities support needs to be engaged not just to win Elections but to provide a basis for a Labour Government in Office. Even Labour’s focus groups underline there is a lot to do here and that is becoming more obvious as time pushes on from July 2024

Labour votes 1983-2024

2024 9.7m

2019 10.3m

2017 12.88m

2015 9.35m

2010 8.61m

2005 9.55m

2001 10.72m

1997 13.52m

1992 11.56m

1987 10.03m

1983 8.46m