How Labour Can Recover From an Epic Defeat

As they awaited the exit poll at 10pm on election night, neither Boris Johnson, nor Jeremy Corbyn, foresaw the scale of the Conservatives' triumph. Until the last moment, Corbyn and his team continued to hold out hope of a hung parliament. Johnson, meanwhile, reportedly expected a majority close to 10 seats. He ultimately secured one of 80, the Conservatives' largest victory since 1987, as Labour endured its worst defeat since 1935. And yet as surprising as this result may appear, the clues were there throughout the campaign. Most opinion polls consistently gave the Conservatives a comfortable lead and, even more tellingly, Labour canvassers spoke frequently of the hostility they attracted. At a Momentum activist training session I attended on 21 November, members were invited to “start shouting out the things that you're worried about coming up”. The answers were swift: “Anti-Semitism, tactical voting for the Lib Dems in Tory areas, magic money tree, IRA, racism, position on Brexit, going backwards to the 1970s, high taxes.