Boris Johnson says he will ‘keep going’ after double byelection loss and Oliver Dowden resignation – UK politics live

Johnson says he will ‘listen’ to voters but ‘keep going’ after historic byelection defeats

PM Media has just snapped this.

Boris Johnson has said he will “listen” to voters but will “keep going” after the Tories suffered a double by-election defeat.

Simon Lightwood, the new Labour MP for Wakefied, being congratulated by a party supporter this morning.
Simon Lightwood, the new Labour MP for Wakefied, being congratulated by a party supporter this morning.
Photograph: Ian Forsyth/Getty Images

Boris Johnson ‘has to go’, says Lib Dem leader Ed Davey

Ed Davey, the Lib Dem leader, has just delivered a victory speech in Tiverton and Honiton saying the Conservatives are running out of excuses for their election defeats. He said:

When we beat them a year ago, in Chesham and Amersham, they said they’d lost because of a small local matter.

When we beat them six months ago in North Shropshire, they said they’d chosen the wrong candidate.

When we beat them last month – in Somerset, in Cumbria, in Wimbledon, in Woking – they chalked it up to “typical mid-term blues”.

The spinners in Number 10 call this “expectation management”.

But I can tell Number 10 – the British people are sick of having their expectations managed.

For years, Boris Johnson has told people things will get better. But under his leadership, things only get worse.

So let me tell the prime minister what the British people expect: they expect our country to be led.

And he has shown no leadership, whatsoever.

He also urged Tory MPs to get rid of their leader.

Boris Johnson has got to go.

But until the next election, the only people who can show Boris Johnson the door are his own party.

So let me take a moment to manage the expectations of Conservative MPs.

If you fail to get rid of this law-breaking prime minister …

If your party keeps putting up taxes and failing to help people …

If you continue to allow Boris Johnson to drift along with no plan for our country – the Liberal Democrats will come after you, seat by seat.

We will assemble an army of activists. We will offer the change people want, and the change our country needs.

We will drive you out of power.

Ed Davey (left) and with the new Lib Dem MP for Tiverton and Honiton, Richard Foord
Ed Davey (left) and with the new Lib Dem MP for Tiverton and Honiton, Richard Foord Photograph: Justin Tallis/AFP/Getty Images

Rishi Sunak, the chancellor, has said all ministers should take responsibility for the byelection defeats. In a tweet responding to Oliver Dowden’s resignation, he is adopting a slightly more contrite tone than Boris Johnson (see 7.30am, 8.02am and 8.42am.)

I’m sad that my colleague and friend @OliverDowden took the decision to resign this morning.

We all take responsibility for the results and I’m determined to continue working to tackle the cost of living, including delivering NICs changes saving 30 million people on average £330

— Rishi Sunak (@RishiSunak) June 24, 2022

David Frost, the former Brexit minister who has now become a prominent advocate for a more rightwing, low-tax, deregulatory Conservatism, claims that the real problem illustrated by the byelection results is that the party is failing to mobilise its voters.

It’s important to cut through the noise and spin on the Wakefield and Tiverton results.

Both are terrible for @Conservatives.

Neither is particularly good for @labour or @LibDems.

Why? (1/4)

— David Frost (@DavidGHFrost) June 24, 2022

In Tiverton there was some Lab/Lib switching, but their total vote as a share of the whole *electorate* only went up from from 25% to 29%.

The Tory vote collapsed from 43% to just under 20%. Nearly 20,000 of our voters stayed at home. That’s why we lost. (2/4)

— David Frost (@DavidGHFrost) June 24, 2022

In Wakefield turnout was extremely low. The Lab/Lib vote actually fell, from 28% to 20%.

But the Tory vote fell even further, from 30% to 12%. That’s why we lost. (3/4)

— David Frost (@DavidGHFrost) June 24, 2022

So, in contrast to many ‘normal’ mid-term by-elections, these do not show strong protest votes for the opposition.

They show people who voted for us in 2019 refusing to come out and do so again.

We as @Conservatives must decide why that is, and what we do about it. (4/4)

— David Frost (@DavidGHFrost) June 24, 2022

Update. Some people, deliberately or not, seem to be reading my comments as suggesting @Conservatives don’t need to worry about these results.

That’s not my point at all. It’s a terrible night & we will lose if we don’t change things.

— David Frost (@DavidGHFrost) June 24, 2022

My point is that the remedy is in our @Conservatives hands. Our voters did not switch to the opposition parties in large numbers. They mostly stayed at home. If we can change that, we can win.

So we must make sure we understand why they did that, & then do something about it.

— David Frost (@DavidGHFrost) June 24, 2022

Lord Frost is right to say voters are not switching wholesale from the Conservatives to Labour.

But he is wrong to suggest that the defeats were mainly a function of turnout. Turnout in Tiverton and Honiton was 52% – which is the joint equal (with Chesham and Amersham) highest byelection turnout of this parliament. And in Wakefield the turnout was not “extremely low”. It was 39.5% – which is almost exactly the average turnout for byelections for this parliament (39.7%).

This is from Nigel Adams, who attends cabinet at a Cabinet Office minister, setting out what seems to be the official CCHQ line to take on the byelections defeats. Like Boris Johnson earlier (see 8.02am), he is arguing that government’s routinely lose byelections mid term.

Sad to see @OliverDowden one of our Party Co-Chairmen stand down.

As the PM says, he understands his disappointment in the by-election losses.

They don’t tell you much about how GE’s pan out. We lost 15 by-elections between 1979 & 1992 but went on to win in 1983, 1987 & 1992. pic.twitter.com/ADUYEctRvb

— Nigel Adams 🇬🇧 (@nadams) June 24, 2022

Although governments often recover from byelection setbacks, they don’t always. Prof Sir John Curtice argues this morning that current Tory defeats are happening on a scale that suggests the general election looks lost too. (See 9.11am.)

James Forsyth, who as as political editor of the Spectator is one of the journalists best tuned in to thinking in the Conservative party, has written a blog saying the byelection defeats make it more likely than before the the 1922 Committee rules will be changed to prevent Tory MPs having to wait another year until they can hold a second no confidence vote in Boris Johnson. Here’s an extract.

Looking at these Tory losses, it is hard not to conclude that the rebels would have got the 180 votes they needed to oust Boris Johnson if they had been organised enough to wait until after the by-elections before going for a vote of no confidence. But having had a vote two weeks ago, it is not credible to suggest changing the rules immediately to allow another one.

However, judging from the conversations I have had with Tory MPs this morning, more of them would now like the option of having another vote sooner than a year from now.

Forsyth says this will be an issue in the elections for the 1922 Committee executive (which has the power to change the rules) before the summer recess.

Last night’s results make it more likely that the elections for the 1922 executive will result in a committee where there’s a majority for a rule change in the right circumstances https://t.co/hRfzrcZjYn

— James Forsyth (@JGForsyth) June 24, 2022

David Gauke, the former Tory justice secretary, says it is obvious from Oliver Dowden’s resignation letter that he wants Boris Johnson to resign. In his contribution to the Guardian’s panel verdict on the byelection results, he explains:

Oliver Dowden. Dowden is an astute political operator and was an early supporter of Boris Johnson in 2019 because he thought Johnson offered the best route to a Conservative general election victory. It is obvious from Dowden’s resignation letter that he now thinks that Johnson’s resignation is the best route to winning the next general election.

When Dowden writes of it no longer being possible to carry on with “business as usual” and that “somebody must take responsibility”, it is not really his own position that he has in mind. The question now is whether other Ministers will follow.

You can read all three panel verdicts here.

And here is Dowden’s letter in full.

Oliver Dowden’s resignation letter.
Oliver Dowden’s resignation letter. Photograph: Oliver Dowden/PA

Here is Lewis Baston’s analysis of the significance of the byelection results.

And here is an extract.

The previous time a government lost two seats in byelections on the same night was on 7 November 1991 when the Conservatives lost Langbaurgh (Cleveland) to Labour and Kincardine and Deeside (Aberdeenshire) to the Liberal Democrats. Conservatives will point out that five months later in the 1992 general election they regained both seats and won an overall majority in the Commons, but they would be unwise to imagine that their problems in 2022 will be resolved so easily.

The swing to Labour in highly marginal Langbaurgh in 1991 was only a quarter of what it was in Wakefield, and Kincardine had been a long-term Lib Dem target as opposed to a triumph from a standing start like Tiverton. Most of the economic bad news had happened by the time of the 1991 byelections, while in 2022 the cliff edge is in front of us; in 1991 the Conservatives had John Major, a new prime minister who was regarded as competent, unifying and honest, while in 2022 they have Boris Johnson.

Starmer says Wakefield byelection win shows Labour on course to form next government

Keir Starmer (in left) in Wakefield this morning, with the new Labour MP for the city, Simon Lightwood
Keir Starmer in Wakefield this morning with the new Labour MP for the city, Simon Lightwood Photograph: Danny Lawson/PA

Keir Starmer was in Wakefield this morning to celebrate Labour’s byelection victory. He claimed it was a historic result that put his party on course to win the next general election. He said:

This swing is significant, 12.7% swing to Labour. That is huge. That tells you that the next government is going to be a Labour government, and the sooner the better because the country voted yesterday, in both byelections, no confidence in this out-of-touch, out-of-ideas government. So this is a historic byelection as far as we’re concerned.

For two years we have been changing the Labour party to make it into that confident party, that party that is facing the voters, that is laser-like focused on the issues that affect them. And that’s why people have put their faith in Simon [Lightwood, the candidate], put their faith in our Labour party. I couldn’t be prouder of this historic moment on the step towards the next Labour government.

Prof Sir John Curtice’s assessment of what the result means for Labour is not quite that positive. (See 9.11am.)

Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer reacts to the Wakefield ‘historic by-election’ and says ‘this is a step towards the next Labour Government’. pic.twitter.com/YDJczgJPTG

— Good Morning Britain (@GMB) June 24, 2022

Here are tweets from two Tory MPs already on the record as calling for Boris Johnson to go who have expressed their support for Oliver Dowden, and said he should not take the blame for the byelection defeats.

From Angela Richardson

From Simon Hoare

An honourable letter from an honourable man. @OliverDowden is not to blame for these results. Since 2015 I have always been proud to call Oliver a friend. Never more so than today. https://t.co/XUAgcrFrdu

— Simon Hoare MP (@Simon4NDorset) June 24, 2022

Steven Morris

Steven Morris

Neil Parish, whose resignation as a Conservative MP over watching porn in the Commons triggered the Tiverton and Honiton byelection, said the Tories should “face reality” and accept Boris Johnson’s unpopularity. Parish told Radio Devon:

What is becoming increasingly necessary for the party and the MPs to discuss what is the long term position of the prime minister. The public are concerned.

You cannot ignore people. It was a very safe seat. I’m afraid at the moment there is too much distraction and we are not getting on with the job.

We are all expendable. That is the issue, is Boris a winner or isn’t he? That will be the issue for MPs going forward.

He can make that decision and he alone will make that decision. You cannot ignore people and you ask them their verdict – and it’s clear their verdict this morning and it is for the PM to look at it very seriously.

Parish said he was “very fond” of Boris Johnson but added: “The trouble is he does bluster and the time for blustering is over and we must really face reality now.”

He said the massive swing against the Tories was a “shock” but he claimed it was “very much a national vote” and added: “I’m afraid the party paid the price for it.”

Parish said of his own downfall: “It’s a shame I made such a terrible mistake.” But he said the presidential style of politics meant the PM was the main focus in the byelection. He said:

It is the leader of your party and their reputation that is up for trial, especially in a byelection.

Neil Parish.
Neil Parish. Photograph: John Keeble/Getty Images

According to Beth Rigby, the Sky News political editor, Boris Johnson was “blindsided” by Oliver Dowden’s resignation. He was not expecting it, even though Dowden had warned him earlier this week to expect defeat in Tiverton and Honiton. Johnson was told about Dowden’s resignation this morning, as he finished an early morning swim in Kigali. He and Dowden had a brief conversation, Rigby said.

Elections expert John Curtice says Tories now doing as badly in byelections as under John Major

Prof Sir John Curtice, the leading psephologist, gave his assessement of the significance of the byelection results to the Today programme earlier. He had bad news for both main parties.

  • Curtice said the Tories were doing as badly in byelections now as John Major’s government was doing in byelections in the 1992-1997 parliament. Over the last year the Conservative vote had fallen by 20 points on average in the byelections where they were defending seats, he said. The Tories won Old Bexley and Sidcup, but lost the other four (Chesham and Amersham, North Shropshire, Wakefield, and Tiverton and Honiton). He said this had not happened since the Major era.
  • Curtice said the Tories should also be worried by the extent of tactical voting against the Conservatives. This was crucial in Tiverton and Honiton, he said. The Labour vote there was down 16 points, he said, and the Lib Dems won by 14 percentage points. (See 6.52am.)
  • But he also said the Wakefield result did not suggest “any great enthusiasm for the Labour party”. The decline in the Conservative vote was more than twice as big as the rise in the Labour vote, he said. (See 6.55am.) He went on:

It looks as though quite a lot of voters in Wakefield who were unhappy with the Conservatives took the opportunity to vote for an independent candidate who was a Tory councillor who resigned in March in part over Partygate. He got 7% of the vote and a lot of that probably came from the Conservatives.

  • Curtice said there were 10 byelections in the 2010-15 parliament where Labour’s share of the vote went up by more than the eight percent points it did in Wakefield. (They were: Oldham East and Saddleworth, Barnsely Central, Leicester South, Feltham and Heston, Corby, Manchester Central, Middlesbrough and Wythenshawe and Sale East.) But Ed Miliband still lost the 2015 general election, he said. Curtice went on:

There still seems to be a question about the extent to which voters, many of whom clearly aren’t happy with the Conservatives, are necessarily as yet bought into Labour as an alternative.

  • He said, on the basis of the swing in Tiverton and Hontiton, there were 333 Conservative MPs who would lose their seats to the Liberal Democrats. Acknowledging that life does not work like this, Curtice said “slightly less nonsensely” the swing to Labour in Wakefield was “probably just enough to generate a Labour overall majority [at a general election]”.
Prof Sir John Curtice
Prof Sir John Curtice Photograph: BBC News

In his Today programme interview Dominic Raab, the justice secretary and deputy first minister, claimed the failure of Conservative supporters to turn out was a key factor in the defeat in Tiverton and Honiton. He said:

My view is that the byelections, both of them, were the result of the perfect storm of very difficult local scenarios, given the situations of the previously sitting Conservative MPs, plus the national headwinds, first of all, inevitably, for a mid-term government, but also, frankly, the distractions that we’ve had.

I think the prime minister put it well: we need to listen very carefully, we need to take that feedback.

I think [with] Tiverton, the most striking thing is how many of our supporters didn’t come out. We need to spend the next two years absolutely relentlessly focused on delivering our plan, without those distractions and with a real calm focus on delivering.

source: theguardian.com