Tories may be in for biggest fall from grace

Exeter 'political trust' expert assesses voter intentions

An Exeter University expert on public trust in politicians says "the government may be in for the biggest electoral fall from grace we’ve seen in a long time.”

Commenting before the extent of the Conservative's thrashing in Tiverton & Honiton became clear, Dr Hannah Bunting warned the party that it must not ignore the message from voters if they wanted to turn their fortunes around.

Most commentators, including local Tories and Lib Dems, thought the contest would be close, and whilst it may have been wishful thinking, one senior local Conservative councillor thought that the party's 24,000 majority would be slashed to around 4,000.

Others said they'd be happy with a one-vote majority, as long as they won.

In the event, Liberal Democrat Richard Foord achieved the biggest ever swing at a by-election and won with a 6,000+ majority to take the seat, or its equivalent, away from the Tories since Stanley Baldwin was prime minister nearly a century ago.

Dr Hannah Bunting, who researches public trust in politics at the University of Exeter and lectures on social data analysis said: “Tiverton and Honiton is not the blue wall, and of course a single by-election result doesn’t predict general election results"

She said the result "does send a signal about people’s views on the government’s behaviour and actions.

"Conservatives planning for future national elections would be foolish not to take note of this trend.

"When we look at all the by-elections of this parliament and current polling figures, the government may be in for the biggest electoral fall from grace we’ve seen in a long time.”