Source: Prospect Magazine
Here are five takeaways, beyond the bleeding obvious, from last week’s election.
- If you discount London, Britain’s major cities will send more Scottish nationalists than Conservatives to Westminster.
It’s worth noting where the Tories made little headway, not just where they made lots. The great majority of their gains were in small and medium-sized towns. Britain has 18 cities outside London with three or more constituencies. In total, they elect 73 MPs. In the new parliament, 53 will be Labour, 11 SNP, eight Conservative and one Liberal Democrat. There will still be no Tory MPs from Bradford, Bristol, Cardiff, Coventry, Edinburgh, Glasgow, Hull, Leeds, Leicester, Liverpool, Manchester, Newcastle, Nottingham or Sheffield.
Nor did the Tories advance in London. They gained two seats and lost two, and still have just 21 of the capital’s 73 MPs. When the Conservatives last won a big national victory in 1987, they had more than two-thirds of London’s MPs.