Lord Ashcroft, the former Tory deputy chairman who is now a polling specialist, carried out a survey of 14,000 people who voted yesterday to investigate why they acted as they did. He has written up his findings here and one of the most interesting details is that Labour voters were more likely to have delayed making a decision.
Labour voters made their minds up much later in the campaign than those who backed the Tories. More than half (57%) of those who voted Labour made their decision in the last month, and more than a quarter (26%) in “the last few days”. Conservatives were more likely to have known how they would vote before the campaign started.
That’s all from me for today.
My colleague Kevin Rawlinson is taking over the blog now.
Ruth Davidson, the Scottish Conservative leader, seems to have reservations about her party getting close to the Democratic Unionist party. She has chosen to post this on Twitter.
As a Protestant Unionist about to marry an Irish Catholic, here's the Amnesty Pride lecture I gave in Belfast...https://t.co/NdRaT2s3W5
For the first time, more than half of MPs elected to the House of Commons were educated in state comprehensive schools, according to a round-up of MPs educational backgrounds published by the Sutton Trust.
The new parliament will have 51% of MPs educated at comprehensives, compared with less than half in 2015, while the proportion of MPs who were privately educated falls to 29%.
Two-thirds of Labour MPs went to comprehensives, along with 38% of Tory MPs. Of the latest intake of 98 MPs - not including the undeclared Kensington constituency - 67% went to comprehensives, while 18% went to state grammar schools.
The shift comes as the Conservative party struggles with its manifesto commitment to open new grammar schools in England. The policy was pushed by Nick Timothy, May’s adviser, but it failed to impress voters and was downplayed during the election campaign.
Almost nine out of 10 of MPs are graduates, with 23% having Oxbridge degrees and 29% attending other Russell Group universities. Oxford with 98 alumni in the House has almost double Cambridge’s 52.
Sir Peter Lampl, founder of the Sutton Trust, said:
If parliament is to truly represent the nation as a whole, able people from all backgrounds should have the opportunity to become MPs.
Labour supporters, campaign groups and trade unionists have joined forces for impromptu protest outside Downing Street.
Dismayed at Theresa May’s decision not to resign and instead to team up with the Democratic Unionist party, tens of people joined the protest which was organised in just a few hours with many more expected to join after office hours.
Protesters were chanting “Hey Ho Theresa May has got to go” and “Tories Tories Tories, Out Out Out” as crowds gathered on Whitehall outside the prime minister’s residence.
Organised on Facebook, one of the organisers, Rees Arnott-Davies, said:
Now of the time to tell Theresa May to do one. Her coalition of chaos with the racist, sexist, homophobic, sectarian DUP can’t stand. This government does not have our confidence.
The Lambeth National Union of Teachers called for members to descend on Whitehall saying: “Theresa May has no right to remain as prime minister. Her mandate has been decimated.”
Protesters outside No 10. Photograph: Nicola Slawson
Hammond, Johnson, Rudd, Davis and Fallon all keep their jobs, No 10 says
Downing Street has just issued this statement. Theresa May’s most senior cabinet ministers are all keeping their jobs.
Downing Street press notice. Photograph: No 10
There was speculation during the campaign that May would move Philip Hammond as chancellor, replacing him perhaps with Amber Rudd, the home secretary. But with May enfeebled by the result, she does not have the authority to demote the government’s second most senior figure.
Tory MP Heidi Allen says May should go within six months
Peter Walker
Heidi Allen, the newly re-elected MP for South Cambridgeshire, has said, in effect, that May should step down and it is only the imminence of Brexit talks which might necessitate her staying on as prime minister for a few more months.
If this were any other election in any other time in our history, then you’d say, oh yes, the prime minister needs to stand down. But this is different, because we’re about to start negotiating, of course, with Brexit.
We do need a prime minister at this moment. I don’t believe personally that Theresa May will stay as our prime minister indefinitely, in my view it may well be just a period of transition. We do need to get some stability.
Allen said the UK should seek to “buy ourselves some time” before starting Brexit talks with the EU, and that this could decide how long May stayed as prime minister. But she said May should not stay longer than six months.
It depends on how those conversations go, but certainly I don’t see any more than six months.
Allen said she would like to see “an entirely new Conservative party”. Asked about the role of May’s key advisers, Fiona Hill and Nick Timothy, Allen blamed the prime minister directly:
Frankly, if the leader picks people who advise her so badly and cannot see that they’re being advised badly then that tells me, I’m afraid, that that’s not the leader we need.
May refuses to commit herself to trying to serve full parliament as PM
Earlier, after going to Buckingham Palace to see the Queen, Theresa May gave a speech outside No 10. (See 1.13pm.) It was a remarkably tone-deaf performance, because at no point did May acknowledge that her party had lost seats or that her decision to call the election had backfired. Her lack of contrition seems to have gone down particularly badly with Tory MPs who lost their seats.
Now May has recorded a clip for broadcasters intended to make up for this omission. Here are the key points.
May said she was “sorry” for the Tory candidates who lost.
I wanted to achieve a larger majority. That was not the result we secured. And I’m sorry for all those candidates and hard-working party workers who weren’t successful, but also for those colleagues who were MPs and ministers and contributed so much to our country and who lost their seats and who didn’t deserve to lose their seats.
She said she would “reflect” on what went wrong.
And, as I reflect on the results, I will reflect on what we need to do in the future to take the party forward.
She sidestepped a question about whether she had been weakened by the result. Asked if this was the case, she just said that it was important to have certainty, which was why she was forming a government in the national interest.
She refused to commit herself herself to trying serve a full parliament as PM. Asked if she could last five years as PM, she replied:
What is important is that we bring the government together, we form a government, in the national interest at this critical time for our country because we do face the challenge of those Brexit negotiations. So it’s important to have a government that can take the negotiations through. That’s what I’m doing, forming a government.
She hinted that her co-chiefs of staff could have their roles changed. When it was put to her that some MPs were calling for “staff changes” (a reference to Nick Timothy and Fiona Hill - see 3.44pm), she said she was currently focused on forming a cabinet. But she went on:
And obviously there will be further ministerial posts and other personnel issues over other days.
It is hard to see “personnel issues” as anything other than a reference to Timothy and Hill.
May says she intends to 'reflect' on why Tories lost seats
Theresa May has recorded a clip for broadcasters. She was criticised earlier for not acknowledging the fact that the Tories had lost seats in her No 10 statement and now she is adopting a more contrite tone.
She says she is sorry about MPs who lost their seats and will reflect on what happened.
Comments (…)
Sign in or create your Guardian account to join the discussion