The British Voter in 2019

What were the factors that shaped the choices of British voters at the ballot box on 12 December 2019? These voters were faced with the options of a governing party promising an ‘oven-ready deal’ and the main party of opposition that had recently resolved to hold a second referendum. How much were the decisions of voters driven by their views on Brexit or influenced by other factors such as leadership, cultural values or left–right ideology? This chapter explores what the parties’ supporters looked like on polling day, the factors that drove voters to switch from Labour to the Conservatives and from Labour to parties in the Unite to Remain pact in England and Wales. Do changes in the geographical pattern of the vote for the two main parties reflect a re-alignment of individual voters around the ‘new’ Brexit divides and identities? What were the patterns of voting observed in Scotland? And how had the two referendums there shifted the party loyalties of voters? A feature of recent elections in the UK has been volatility in voting behaviour. The biggest surprise of the 2019 campaign was that there were few surprises. Following a rollercoaster year in the polls, voters’ intentions proved to be remarkably stable during the short campaign, largely unmoved by happenings on the campaign trail. This chapter puts the stability of the election campaign into the context of changes in voting behaviour that have had been occurring for some time, but which were thrust into the psephological spotlight in 2019, as parts of the electorate moved decisively away from Labour and towards the Conservatives.