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How do recency (short-term) factors affect voting behaviour?

  1. SALIENT ISSUES
  • According to an April 2015 YouGov poll, the most ‘salient’ issue in 2015 was the economy. Whilst Labour was considered the best party to manage the economy in 1997, 2001 and 2007, YouGov found that, in 2015, 39% of voters felt that the Conservatives would manage the economy best, with only 21% saying Labour.
  • On the second most salient issue, the NHS, Labour had almost as big a lead.
  • However, on the third most salient issue, immigration, voters were much more divided, with many voters picking ‘other’ parties, (predominantly UKIP).
  • Labour’s Beckett report suggested that the party’s inability to project a strong stance on immigration allowed UKIP “to exploit the claim that the major parties were all out of touch on this issue.”
  • The fact that the Conservatives led on the economy, but not on other salient issues, correlates with their slim majority win.
  1. PARTY REPUTATION
  • Polls by Ipsos Mori showed that the Conservatives were considered to have a better team of leaders and better overall policies than Labour.
  • The public also considered that a Conservative majority would be best for the economy. Both parties exploited weaknesses in each others’ reputations during the 2015 campaign. After the Coalition’s spending cuts from 2010-15, Labour warned that there were only days to “save the NHS” from the even larger cuts that a majority Conservative government would make.
  • Meanwhile, the Conservatives argued that electing Labour would be like “handing the keys back to the people who crashed the car”, and right-wing commentators made much of Ed Miliband’s failure to mention the national deficit in his 2014 conference speech.
  • Labour’s 2016 Beckett Report noted that one of the most commonly cited reasons for the party’s defeat was the “failure to shake off the myth that we were responsible for the financial crash and therefore failure to build trust in the economy.”
  1. PARTY LEADERS
  • Approval ratings​ – Support within party in 2019: 86% of conservative supporters approve of the job that Mr Johnson is doing​ – Average approval rating in polls, pre-election 2019: 39% approve, 40% disapprove.
  • Key Ideas​ – Used “Get Brexit Done” as his key slogan, capitalised on leave vote in 2016. This simple message proved very effective against Corbyn’s idea of a second referendum but not saying what side he would support​.
  • Corbyn approval ratings​ – Within party: only 63% . Average approval rating in polls, pre-election 2019:20% approve, 58% disapprove​
  • Successes​ – Resonated well with more socialist, left-wing and youth voters through his previous support for human rights and the NHS​
  • Controversies​ – Labour campaigners said his past support for the Irish republican movement came up repeatedly on the doorsteps.​
  • Refused to apologise for antisemitism in the Labour party in an interview with Andrew Neil​.
  • He refused to confirm Labour’s stance on Brexit in various TV interviews as Corbyn was put in a difficult position since he had to appeal to both Leave and Remain voters​
  • Wasn’t viewed as credible with his proposed management of the economy raised by concerns of extremely high government spending in the Labour Manifesto.
  • Following his election as party leader in 2010, Ed Miliband struggled to win public approval and support, regularly polling far below David Cameron.
  • In November 2014, Miliband’s net approval rating dipped as low as -54, with 17% saying he was performing well, but 73% saying he was performing badly
  1. MEDIA/TV DEBATES
  • Following his election as party leader, right wing papers consistently portrayed Miliband as an extremely left-wing leader. They characterised him as “Red Ed”, a socialist who was “dragging the party to the left”.
  • The Sun ran regular articles in England on the dangers of a Labour-SNP coalition, whilst the Scottish Sun supported the SNP as a “better” choice over Labour. In 2015, the vast majority of newspapers endorsed the Conservative party, with only 1 of the 8 major UK papers backing Labour.
  • Research conducted throughout the campaign found that Conservative sources were more frequently reported and quoted than their opponents, and that there was more coverage of the economy, a Conservative strength, than other salient issues like the NHS and education, both Labour strengths.
  • The first debate of 2015, and the only one in which David Cameron appeared, attracted an audience of 7 million people.
  • The final YouGov poll gauging who performed best in this debate found Nicola Sturgeon to be the winner with 28% of the vote, UKIP leader Nigel Farage came in second with 20%, Cameron had 18%, and Miliband 15%.
  • Sturgeon’s success was notable, with “can I vote for the SNP?” as the sixth most searched question on Google by the end of the evening.
  • With Cameron absent, the remaining debates gave Plaid Cymru, UKIP, the Green Party and the SNP much greater exposure, and all four parties increased their share of the vote from 2010.