Will Medway turn turquoise?

Medway politics used to look fairly familiar. Labour or Conservative, red or blue, with everyone else fighting over the edges. Alan Collins is not so sure that still holds. In this guest piece, the Medway Elects founder looks at the wider splintering of British politics and what it could mean locally, including whether Reform is now better placed than any challenger party before it to break through here.

Will Medway turn turquoise?

by Alan Collins

In 2005, the BBC spy drama Spooks took on the political world with a storyline about a politician from an (unnamed) established party defecting to an upstart right-wing party and calling a by-election to seek his constituents’ approval. Sound familiar?

It served as a warning of what would now be called extreme right-wing terrorism. Its target was the British National Party, an ideological successor to the National Front, which had started winning elections at a local level. The party in the episode was the “British Way,” with the MI5 agent embedded within the party machine taken, among other things, on a crossbow hunt in a local Asian supermarket. Comparisons with the party’s policies and 1930s Germany were rife.

As a Spooks fan in my younger years and (even then) a political geek, I can recall the episode vividly. One of my favourite interactions was when Harry Pearce (Section D chief) and Fiona Carter (an agent) were talking to a seasoned politician considering crossing the floor. The dialogue, as always, included the occasional quip among the serious conversation:

Harry: “Look, I’ve grown attached to a stable two party...”

Fiona: “Three.”

Harry: “What, we’re including the little Scottish chap?”

Fiona: *shrugs*

Harry: “Okay, three party system. Let’s not throw away something that’s served us so well.”

The “little Scottish chap” was, of course, Charles Kennedy, then leader of the Liberal Democrats. Mere months before the broadcast, they had polled 22% and won 62 seats in the general election. Between them, Labour and the Conservatives had polled 68%. The rest of the parties fighting that election had to feed off the scraps of the remaining 10%.

Fast-forward 20 years, and in the recent Gorton and Denton by-election, none of those parties made it into the top two. The Conservatives and Liberal Democrats each polled less than 2%, losing their deposits, while Labour had to settle for third place on 25%, half their vote share in the 2024 general election. The Green Party (winners) and Reform UK (runners up) polled 69% between them. Labour had not just lost the seat, they had fallen behind a traditionally minor party and a party which was only formed in November 2018.

Government parties losing by-elections is nothing new. Smaller parties winning by-elections is also nothing new. Since the general election in 1992, there have been 116 parliamentary by-elections. 55 were in seats where the party of government was the incumbent, and in those by-elections, the governing party held onto 23 seats but lost 32 to opposition parties. In contrast, of the 61 by-elections in opposition seats, only four were gained by the governing party (although many changed hands between opposition parties).

Labour have gained 11 seats while in opposition, with all but one of those gains coming in the last term of a Conservative government. The Conservatives have fared less well, gaining just four seats in by-elections: two while in opposition and, somewhat bucking the usual trend, gaining Copeland and, famously, Hartlepool from Labour while in government (in 2017 and 2021, respectively). Labour have also gained two seats while in government, but both of those were from resigning Speakers who had previously been Labour MPs.

The Liberal Democrats are famous for their by-election wins: although, since 1992, they have barely outperformed Labour, as the traditional third party usually squeezed out under first past the post, their 13 gains from the governing party sees them top of the table for giving the government of the day a kicking. Their sole by-election defence while in government was, somewhat incredibly, in view of their collapse in support after entering into coalition with the Conservatives, also a hold, making them technically the only party of government since 1992 not to lose a seat in a by-election. They did, however, lose 49 seats in the 2015 general election, somewhat ironically including the seat they held onto in that by-election.

Gorton and Denton is the Green Party’s first win in a by-election. Reform UK have also only won a single parliamentary by-election, in Runcorn and Helsby last year. Even George Galloway has won more by-elections, with his former Respect party in Bradford West in 2012 and with his new Workers Party in Rochdale in 2024.

The Green Party's win in Gorton and Denton is not a game changer as far as the politics of by-elections goes, but it is part of a wider realignment of voting patterns.