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49 Reasons the Conservative Party lost the 2024 General Election

The Conservative Party Lost the 2024 Election Very Badly

Here are 49 rough ideas on why I think the Conservative Party lost the election.

Please note: this list is a work in progress, not in any particular order of importance, and is also a little tongue-in-cheek — a bit of fun. So there are no citations etc as again its just a bit of fun.

  1. Staff and leadership got captured by their own algorithms.
  2. Greedy betting gave the Labour Party the heads-up on the election.
  3. Rishi Sunak was a bad communicator.
  4. Boris Johnson and Liz Truss had trashed the brand.
  5. Osborne Syndrome — the obsession with winning elections over governing led to bad government outcomes.
  6. It failed on Brexit.
  7. The demographics of Britain changed while they were in office.
  8. Let landlordism run amok.
  9. Massive decrease in homeownership, stock ownership, and financial security.
  10. Acted and governed as the Pensioners' Party and not a One Nation Party.

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  1. Over-communicated the "levelling up" agenda and isolated their core southern voters — whilst not actually "levelling up".
  2. Thatcherism became a revolution with no end or enemies, so it started attacking the institutions that made Britain great.
  3. Culture war nonsense. Day in, day out.
  4. Attacking home working.
  5. A five-year focus on tactical media comms that won the day but lost the war.
  6. A large number of shy Conservatives died whilst they were in office — and were not replaced.
  7. Housing costs in large cities moved more educated, liberal professionals out of city centres and made the commuter belt more like London.
  8. Focus on astroturfed campaigns over activist-led ones.
  9. Losing councillors year after year without replacing them.
  10. Increasing the age of the party — in both voters and members.
  11. Attachment to large-scale wealthy donors made campaigning easy... until the donations stopped.
  12. Private renters became Labour and Liberal Democrat voters, not Conservatives.
  13. The Brexit purge ideologically narrowed the party and reduced its broad church nature.
  14. Weird obsessions — ULEZ, gender-neutral toilets, lefty lawyers.
  15. The Nasty and Incompetent Party.
  16. Rishi Sunak’s career was separated from the real world — private school, Oxford, the City, California, Westminster. It isolated him from both British politics and normal people, making it a difficult sell.
  17. LIZ TRUSS.
  18. Austerity.
  19. Parties at Number 10.
  20. Losing the graduate vote.
  21. Losing the non-graduate vote.
  22. Losing the master's graduate vote.
  23. Losing the male vote.
  24. Losing the female vote.
  25. The voting public had decided it was time for change.
  26. Lost voters in Scotland and Wales by sounding and acting very "English" (in a bad way).
  27. Sending former minister Laura Trott out to say dead cat bounce stuff on almost every occasion.
  28. Became the party of landlords, pensions, and "motorists".
  29. Did not fix the potholes.
  30. Sewage in the rivers and sea.
  31. Energy bills got too high.
  32. Gas bills got too high.
  33. Mortgage and rent bills got too high.
  34. Government by WhatsApp, coupled with rebellion by WhatsApp.
  35. They didn’t have a Labour leader who was a communist, granola-eating, terrorist-loving geography teacher to scare the public into voting for them.
  36. The public forgot they disliked the Liberal Democrats (well done, Ed!).
  37. The Murdoch-led right-wing press lost their place as opinion-setters in the age of influencers, social media, and direct communications.
  38. No one to deliver leaflets.
  39. Boris Johnson. Boris Johnson. Boris Johnson.

We are all glad they have gone.

If you are interested, a few years ago I wrote a book called Political Careers, which can help guide you in starting a career in British Politics .It is available on Amazon

#Conservatives #GE24 #General Election #Labour #Liberal Democrats #Tories