{"id":715929,"date":"2022-06-24T14:20:57","date_gmt":"2022-06-24T14:20:57","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.thecanary.co\/?p=1609158"},"modified":"2022-06-24T14:20:57","modified_gmt":"2022-06-24T14:20:57","slug":"the-hot-takes-on-labours-wakefield-win-are-laughable","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/2022\/06\/24\/the-hot-takes-on-labours-wakefield-win-are-laughable\/","title":{"rendered":"The hot takes on Labour\u2019s Wakefield win are laughable"},"content":{"rendered":"<div data-beyondwords-player=\"true\" contenteditable=\"false\"><\/div><p>Labour has won the Wakefield by-election, taking the seat from the Tories. But the data shows this isn&#8217;t any kind of resounding victory. Yet if you believed the party and the pundits then the result was &#8216;beyond their wildest dreams&#8217;.<\/p>\n<h2>Wakefield: wild?<\/h2>\n<p>As <em>Britain Elects<\/em> noted, Labour won Wakefield with 47.9% of the vote:<\/p>\n<p><span class=\"5FRzdKOA9uHR42Xl6jBogpba2trSVVr0igkfUEO1x5IJlZmQZvG49Mt1xswNTvXDKEH6kqcYqjcNFYaCS3TeA\"><\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\" data-width=\"500\" data-dnt=\"true\">\n<p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">Wakefield parliamentary by-election result<\/p>\n<p>LAB: 47.9% (+8.1)<br \/>CON: 30.0% (-17.3)<br \/>IND (Akbar): 7.6% (+7.6)<br \/>YRK: 4.3% (+2.4)<\/p>\n<p>Labour GAIN from Conservative.<\/p>\n<p>&mdash; Britain Elects (@BritainElects) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/BritainElects\/status\/1540167326003339264?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">June 24, 2022<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/span><\/p>\n<p>Across the media and on Twitter, Labour MPs are oozing positivity about the result. For example, shadow transport secretary <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/lewis_goodall\/status\/1540229896273813505\"  rel=\"noopener\">Louise Haigh<\/a> told <em>BBC Breakfast<\/em>:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>We were obviously hoping for victory last night in Wakefield, but the result went beyond our wildest dreams. It was a higher turnout than we expected, a much bigger swing, and a much bigger vote share as well.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>Haigh must have pretty tame dreams if the Wakefield result was beyond her &#8220;wildest&#8221; ones. Because actually, as pollster <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/benrileysmith\/status\/1540242921722707968\"  rel=\"noopener\">John Curtice<\/a> noted, what actually happened was the Tories&#8217; vote share collapsed more than Labour&#8217;s share rose. Never mind, though &#8211; because <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/Keir_Starmer\/status\/1540244877480443904\"  rel=\"noopener\">Keir Starmer<\/a> branded the result as:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>A historic victory \u2014 this city deserved a fresh start.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>&#8220;Historic&#8221; is debatable. Because given the scandals surrounding Boris Johnson &#8211; Labour should have hammered the Tories. Plus, based on the size of the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.bbc.co.uk\/news\/politics\/constituencies\/E14001009\"  rel=\"noopener\">electorate in 2019<\/a> and the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.wakefield.gov.uk\/elections\/elections-2022\/by-election-results-2022\"  rel=\"noopener\">turnout<\/a> &#8211; in reality only around 19% of the voting public voted for Labour.<\/p>\n<h2>Status quo, maintained<\/h2>\n<p>Ultimately the Wakefield by-election is useless as a public opinion gauge. Because the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.wakefield.gov.uk\/elections\/elections-2022\/by-election-results-2022\"  rel=\"noopener\">turnout was just 39.5%<\/a> &#8211; way down on the <a href=\"https:\/\/electionresults.parliament.uk\/election\/2019-12-12\/Results\/Location\/Constituency\/Wakefield\/\"  rel=\"noopener\">general election<\/a>. This is much like 2021&#8217;s <a href=\"https:\/\/www.thecanary.co\/uk\/analysis\/2021\/07\/02\/the-real-story-of-batley-and-spen-isnt-george-galloway\/\"  rel=\"noopener\">Batley and Spen by-election<\/a>, where Labour spun-it as some sort of victory when turnout was <a href=\"https:\/\/members.parliament.uk\/constituency\/3309\/election\/401\"  rel=\"noopener\">less than 50%<\/a>. <a href=\"https:\/\/www.thecanary.co\/uk\/analysis\/2021\/07\/02\/the-real-story-of-batley-and-spen-isnt-george-galloway\/\"  rel=\"noopener\">Both<\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/research.mysociety.org\/sites\/imd2019\/area\/la-wakefield-borough-council\/lsoa\/\"  rel=\"noopener\">constituencies<\/a> have higher rates of poverty than other parts of England. Hartlepool was a similar story: <a href=\"https:\/\/research.mysociety.org\/sites\/imd2019\/area\/la-hartlepool-borough-council\/lsoa\/\"  rel=\"noopener\">poverty<\/a> met a by-election and the result was a <a href=\"https:\/\/www.thecanary.co\/uk\/analysis\/2021\/05\/07\/voter-apathy-lost-labour-hartlepool-not-jeremy-corbyn\/\"  rel=\"noopener\">turnout of less than 50%<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>Our systems of politics and democracy, and their proponents, disenfranchise the poorest people. So much so, that they rightly feel voting will change nothing. The difference in a richer area, like Tiverton and Honiton, is clear. Its by-election saw a <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/BritainElects\/status\/1540129711786958851\"  rel=\"noopener\">52% turnout<\/a> and the Lib Dems got in &#8211; while the constituency has much lower rates of <a href=\"https:\/\/research.mysociety.org\/sites\/imd2019\/area\/wmc-tiverton-and-honiton\/lsoa\/\"  rel=\"noopener\">deprivation<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>So, no &#8211; the Wakefield election wasn&#8217;t a victory for Labour. It was a victory for the political and media class, who&#8217;ve maintained the status quo. And it&#8217;s all thanks to their disenfranchisement of the poorest people.<\/p>\n<p><em>Featured image via <a href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=DoW7agS6bRs\"  rel=\"noopener\">Good Morning Britain &#8211; YouTube<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n<p>By <a rel=\"nofollow\" href=\"https:\/\/www.thecanary.co\/author\/steve-topple\/\">Steve Topple<\/a><\/p>\n\n<p class=\"syndicated-attribution\">This post was originally published on <a href=\"https:\/\/www.thecanary.co\/trending\/2022\/06\/24\/the-hot-takes-on-labours-wakefield-win-are-laughable\/\">The Canary<\/a>. <\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Labour has won the Wakefield by-election, taking the seat from the Tories. But the data shows this isn\u2019t any kind of resounding victory. Yet \u2026 <\/p>\n<div class=\"read-more-wrap\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.thecanary.co\/trending\/2022\/06\/24\/the-hot-takes-on-labours-wakefield-win-are-laughable\/\" class=\"more-link\">Read more<\/a><\/div>\n<p>By <a rel=\"nofollow\" href=\"https:\/\/www.thecanary.co\/author\/steve-topple\/\">Steve Topple<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1538,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[50384,5625,432,932,5627,34,5594,1395],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/715929"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1538"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=715929"}],"version-history":[{"count":194,"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/715929\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":751081,"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/715929\/revisions\/751081"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=715929"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=715929"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=715929"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}