Labour landslide heralds new era

After weeks of campaigning, voters have had their say at the UK general election in what had been hailed in the national papers as a ‘day of reckoning’ for the Tories.

All the polls in the run-up to the election showed that Labour was on course to secure a major majority in the House of Commons – and so they did, reflecting voters’ desire for change after 14 years of Tory rule.

But unlike Labour’s 1997 landslide – which saw Tony Blair become prime minister with a 178 majority following the biggest swing between the two major parties seen since the Second World War at 10.2 percentage points – Sir Keir Starmer’s victory has, perhaps, less to do with Labour’s own merits than the fact it is not the Conservative Party.

The new Prime Minister said yesterday that Labour was ‘ready for what comes next’.

But any honeymoon period is likely to be brief. In the years since Labour was last in power, life has got measurably worse for many in Britain, with a housing affordability crisis, over-reliance on food banks and a struggling NHS.

As David Blunkett says in our interview published today, ‘This government will face really difficult choices almost immediately.’

How it will rise to that challenge remains to be seen.