No complacency.
The dictat from Labour high command is that nothing can be taken for granted – certainly not the 99% likelihood which Sir John Curtice places on Labour forming the next government, after the general election.
Victory, even a smashing one, is a possibility however – at least according to stubbornly consistent opinion polls.
The latest major survey, by YouGov, gives Sir Keir Starmer a landslide victory of a scale just short of Tony Blair’s landslide in 1997 when Labour won a 179-seat majority.
It gives Labour 403 MPs, the Conservatives 155, Liberal Democrats 49 and the SNP 23 – amounting to a 154 Labour overall majority.
Another recent large survey, by Survation using the same MRP technique of big samples analysed by region, is more apocalyptic for the Conservatives. It pushes the Tories down to around only 100 MPs and would give Sir Keir a record-breaking 256 majority.
Labour’s current representation in the Commons would double while the Conservatives would be more than halved.
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The Reform Party would have no MPs.
In both these MRP polls and in the numerous national opinion polls over the last couple of years, prominent Conservative MPs and ministers are on course to lose their seats.
Those at risk include Iain Duncan Smith, Jacob Rees Mogg, Penny Mordaunt, Jeremy Hunt, Grant Shapps and James Cleverly.
Public opinion seems remarkably settled. Many Conservative MPs feel nobody is listening to them anymore.
Who would be in a landslide Labour government?
Just suppose the polls are right for once and the gap between the parties does not narrow in the run-up to voting, the nation, if not the ever-cautious Labour leadership, needs to start thinking what a landslide Labour government would look like.
There is nothing like the enthusiasm there was for the charismatic Tony Blair in 1997 – Keir Starmer has negative personal ratings, only much better than Rishi Sunak.
Voters are more disillusioned by politicians of any kind than they were then but a landslide would be a landslide and there are some comparisons to be drawn.
When a team wins comfortably it is difficult to change the line-up. It must be assumed that Prime Minister Starmer will flank himself with the same shadow cabinet in the same jobs.
In the great offices of state, neither David Lammy at the Foreign Office nor Chancellor Rachel Reeves would arrive with anything like the authority and reputation enjoyed by Robin Cook and Gordon Brown.
They would also be coming in at more difficult times economically and internationally.
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At the Home Office, the veteran Yvette Cooper is a match for Jack Straw. She will need to deal credibly with immigration, currently the most inflamed topic of public concern.
Fresh creative thinking is more likely to come from less senior ministers such as Wes Streeting at health and deputy leader Angela Rayner.
Starmer plans to keep control by building up an executive government consisting of himself, Reeves, Rayner and Pat McFadden. Reeves and McFadden are primarily enforcers of economic discipline. Tensions may soon emerge even in this top group as Starmer and Reeves come under internal pressure to deliver tangible improvements in public services.
Labour will lack excuses if the polls are accurate
An overwhelming majority would deprive Labour of excuses not to deliver on what it has promised.
In its first 100 days, the new Labour government will have to enact what little it has trailed including VAT on private schools and a new deal for workers and trade unions.
It would be able get anything through parliament. This, along with trying not to put up unnecessary targets for the Conservatives, may explain the lack of specificity about the five missions which Starmer has set himself.
It may be that something similar to Blair’s pledge card, which set up modest achievable goals in the main areas of public concern, emerges during the campaign.
At present there are little more than warm words from Labour on improving growth, the NHS, green energy, education and childcare. Similarly Reeves is promising reorganisation and new quangos which only relate remotely to the high growth economy Labour says it needs.
In a landslide, more than half of Labour’s MPs will be first-timers at Westminster. There has been an effort to select “Starmtroopers” in winnable seats, but the leadership will not know them all.
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The new Labour parliamentary party will be younger. Millennial concerns such as housing and the cost of universities will be higher up the agenda.
The backfiring of Brexit on the Conservatives and gender self-ID on the Scottish government is likely to discourage bids to force the pace on divisive issues.
Neither his MPs nor the party conference gave Blair much trouble during his first term. Starmer would likely benefit as well from a mix of inexperience and gratitude.
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With the new prime minister simultaneously committed to executive government and “powering up” the regions, challenge from within Labour is likely to come from the mayors in Manchester, Liverpool and London, assuming they are re-elected in their own right this year.
Her Majesty’s Opposition cannot be expected to put up much actual opposition if crushed in a landslide.
The Conservatives would be impotent in parliament and, if 1997-2005 is anything to go by, more interested in their own internal battles over party leadership.
The Liberal Democrats would relish their restoration as the UK’s official third force at the expense of the SNP. Little beyond virtue signalling can be expected from either of those parties.
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The shadow of Tony Blair’s New Labour
For much of Blair’s time in office, constructive scrutiny of the government was led by the mainstream media, courted and cajoled by Peter Mandelson and Alastair Campbell.
There will be no repeat of this. The print and broadcast landscape has fragmented with many outlets more committed to campaigning than reporting fairly.
Like Barack Obama and Joe Biden in the US, Starmer should expect to come under vicious assault from day one. There will be no honeymoon.
After what will have been a “time for a change” election, the electorate may be inclined to give the new government the benefit of the doubt for a long period – but how long?
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Starmer has repeatedly signalled that his government will need two terms to deliver real change. A landslide victory would provide the best basis on which to build.
In hindsight, Tony Blair has repeatedly bemoaned that his government got off to a slow start and failed to deliver as much as it could have done in its first term.
Far from planning for a landslide, his campaign team before his first victory were preoccupied with preparations for coalition with Paddy Ashdown’s Liberal Democrats.
Caution is one thing, making the best of your opportunities is another. The many voters telling the pollsters that they want a Labour victory must hope that someone, somewhere in Starmer’s rigid hierarchy is thinking hard about what they would do with a big win.
