Labour’s poll lead could still collapse, shadow
ministers warned
Chief strategist uses examples from around world to
urge against complacency, warning ‘polls do not predict the future’
Kiran
Stacey Political correspondent
Wed 3 Jan
2024 09.30 GMT
Labour’s
poll lead could collapse in the weeks before the general election, the party’s
chief campaign strategist has told shadow ministers, as he warned them not to
be complacent going into the election year.
Morgan
McSweeney, Labour’s director of campaigns, recently gave a presentation to the
shadow cabinet in which he showed MPs what happened in the months before eight
different elections from around the world. In each case, the clear favourite
lost after their poll lead disappeared in the weeks leading up to the vote.
The
presentation, seen by the Guardian, was designed to instil a sense of
discipline as the party enters the election year about 18 points ahead in the
polls. That message will be repeated by the party leader, Keir Starmer, in a
speech on Thursday setting out Labour’s plans for the final months before the
general election, which could come as early as May.
In his
presentation, McSweeney warned: “Polls do not predict the future; nobody has
voted in the general election; change won’t happen unless people vote for it.”
According
to one person who was there, the Labour campaign chief compared being focused
on polls to driving while looking in the rear-view mirror. Another attender
said: “It showed us what complacency looked like in other countries: a Labour
loss.”
McSweeney’s
message is designed to maintain party unity behind the strategy he has sketched
out alongside the party leader, Keir Starmer, and the shadow chancellor, Rachel
Reeves.
The plan
involves proving the party’s credibility to voters by refusing to make election
promises unless they are fully funded, while also ruling out major changes to
levels of income or wealth taxes. Support for the strategy is likely to be
tested in the coming weeks as shadow ministers tussle to ensure their plans are
included in the party’s election manifesto, which is due to be completed by the
end of this month.
Some senior
figures in the party believe Starmer should be making bolder policy choices
given the party has such a strong lead going into 2024. McSweeney’s
presentation was designed in part to rebut this argument.
In it,
McSweeney, who is one of Starmer’s closest advisers, showed shadow ministers
what happened before a range of elections from around the world, including the
Australian election of 2019, the Norwegian election of 2017 and the UK election
of 2017.
In each
one, one party went into the election with a significant poll lead, only for it
to crumble in the final stages of the campaign.
In
Australia, Labor were ahead in the polls for well over two years, and had a
seven-point lead going at the beginning of the election year. However, the lead
collapsed just before the election, giving the governing Liberal-National
coalition an unexpected victory. An internal party review later argued Labor
had lost because it went into the election promising radical change, allowing
the coalition to argue that voting for the opposition party would be a risk.
In Norway,
the opposition Labour party led by about 20 points two years before the
country’s general election but ended up losing after saying it would put up
taxes if it won, in an attempt to improve the country’s finances. The party
dropped about 5 points during the campaign, which was dominated by discussion
about its tax pledge.
In the UK
in 2017, Theresa May saw a similarly commanding poll lead evaporate after
promising to shake up Britain’s social care system in a way opponents said
would mean some people having to sell all their assets to pay for their own
care.
.jpg)
.jpg)
Sem comentários:
Enviar um comentário