A Labour government would face a truly daunting task to steer UK away from populist right

As the results of the 2019 general election came in, Labour’s Chris Bryant conceded it had been “the worst night” for his party since 1935. In Scotland, Labour won just a single seat, compared to the SNP’s 48.

Five years later, and it is the Conservatives who are facing the prospect of a UK election defeat of historically bad proportions, while Labour’s fortunes have recovered. A new poll for The Scotsman puts Keir Starmer’s party and the SNP on 34 per cent each, but projections by Professor John Curtice suggest the former would win 28 seats to the latter’s 18, because of the vagaries of the first-past-the-post system.

Such dramatic swings reveal a high degree of volatility in our politics as people search for politicians with an answer to their problems. The weight of expectation behind the increase in support for Labour feels so great as to be almost tangible.

The pressure on Keir Starmer to lead the country to a better place will be immense (Picture: Leon Neal/Getty Images)

However, with most economists predicting tough times ahead, Labour could start to struggle, particularly if the country is rocked by outside factors beyond their control, as the Conservative government has been.

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We should perhaps be grateful, after the trauma the country has been through in recent years, that the electorate appears willing to choose another mainstream party. But that may be because there’s not really an alternative. The emergence of a charismatic populist with some money behind them could change that. Nigel Farage likes to think he’s the one, but we suspect he may prove to be too divisive a figure.

So there is a huge amount riding on the success of the expected Labour government – particularly if they win a ‘super-majority’ – and not just for Starmer and co. Labour has a chance to demonstrate the merits of small-L liberal government, to pull politics back towards the centre ground, a shift that would help sensible, pro-business, One Nation Conservatives re-exert themselves.

If Starmer fails to live up to voters’ expectations, the danger is that the siren calls of hard-right, nationalistic populism may become increasingly appealing. Make no mistake, the challenge faced by our next Prime Minister is a truly daunting one.