The election of Bev Craig as the new mayor of Greater Manchester has revealed a critical insight into the future of progressive politics: voters on the left are more fragmented than ever, but they can coalesce behind a convincing cross-party message. According to Neal Lawson, director of the cross-party campaign organisation Compass, the results show progressives standing at the threshold of a new era, but only if they work together.
Second Preferences Drive Craig's Victory
Craig was elected using the supplementary vote system, which takes into account voters' second preferences if no candidate secures more than half of the first-round votes. Despite the so-called 'Burnham bounce', Labour received only 47% of the first-round vote, significantly lower than Andy Burnham's previous campaigns, where he never fell below 63%.
However, when second preferences were counted, an estimated seven in ten progressives who had backed other parties switched their support to Craig. This pattern confirms that we live in an age of bloc politics, pitting left against right. Few voters now shift between blocs, but many move between parties within their own bloc.
Progressive Voters: Promiscuous Yet Disciplined
The Manchester mayoral vote saw the progressive bloc consolidate behind Labour, similar to how they backed Burnham in Makerfield, but they also supported the Greens in Gorton and Denton earlier in the year and Plaid Cymru in a Senedd byelection at the end of last year. This illustrates two simultaneous trends: voters are becoming more promiscuous in their genuine support, yet highly disciplined in their actual voting behaviour.
Voters seem to back the progressive candidate best placed to beat the right, but only if that candidate is deemed sufficiently progressive. This amorphous mix of progressive voters appears capable of ruthlessly flocking around the same candidate when necessary.
Challenges of Fragmented Politics
Given that UK politics is likely to remain incredibly fragmented, progressive parties and voters face two major challenges: winning elections and governing effectively. Within this fragmented bloc lurks the danger of 'progressive tragedies', where a majority progressive vote splits and allows the right bloc to win. The bloc that wins today is the one that most efficiently organises its total vote.
But it's not just the quantity of the progressive vote that matters; it's the quality. While majorities can be won with a small percentage of the vote, as in the 2024 general election, these victories do not deliver strong government because people are merely backing the least bad option. As soon as the going gets tough, this negative support melts away. Unless Burnham can reach and maintain something like 40% backing, governing will remain treacherous.
Labour's Doom Loop of Failure
Labour has been trapped in a doom loop of failure for too long, according to Lawson. By deciding to go it alone and not work with other progressive parties, it can only win under first-past-the-post by appealing to centre-right voters. This means promising little or no change. With no mandate for radical change, Labour sets itself up to fail, losing the red wall, Scotland, Wales, support from Muslim voters, and now inner-city seats.
The clever move would be to mobilise the country's whole progressive majority based on a transformative offer. This fragmented landscape can and must be woven together in a way that combines values, policies, and electoral performance.
Burnham's Cross-Party Legacy
There are good omens for this approach, starting with Burnham himself. He built a long-term cross-party consensus in Manchester, which was the basis for sustained state and private sector investment and the fastest-growing economy in the country. His experience with the supplementary vote, where securing second preferences required listening and engaging with non-Labour voters, led him to back a fully proportional voting system.
But the mobilisation of any latent progressive majority requires deeper roots than just transactional electoral politics. This is why Burnham's cross-party move on social care matters. While he should have involved the Greens, he recognises that some big issues need a broad and permanent consensus. This principle should be extended, not least to delivering a low-carbon economy. Processes such as this build trust across parties and reveal just how much progressives have in common.
Learning from Byelections and Clacton
Problems still abound. Progressive consolidation works in byelections where media attention and polling send a signal to voters about who to back. But unless progressives work out how to organise their bloc in a general election, the chaos of many progressive tragedies will ensue.
In this regard, Clacton shows the way. It is woeful that the progressive parties have all pulled out, leaving voters with no serious choice about who represents them. As in Tatton in 1997, where the anti-corruption journalist Martin Bell stood against the sitting Tory MP and won, moves should have been made to field a credible centre-right independent to challenge Reform.
However, a critical precedent has been re-established: these so-called 'national' parties don't always put up candidates. Now they've stood aside, they can repeat it. Why stand a candidate in a seat you have no hope of winning, only making it more likely that the national populist right wins? At the next election, local parties should be empowered to decide whether to stand or not.
The Case for Proportional Representation
The change to unlock all of this is proportional representation (PR), the promise of which massively helps consolidate the progressive vote at the next election. Burnham and the Labour party staunchly back it. Combined with manifesto promises from the Liberal Democrats and the Greens, a super-majority for change could transform our political system for good. This is why the vote in the Commons on 2 September on an elections bill amendment setting up a national commission to pave the way for PR is a critical litmus test of Burnham's commitment to a new politics for a new society.
British politics has never been more volatile and will continue to be so. Yes, the Burnham bounce is welcome. But will it last? No one should think the resourceful and ruthless British right will simply sit back and let progressives win. They will unite the right if they must.
As ever, the people are ahead of the politicians. If the parties can catch up and stop their self-defeating tribalism, then progressives won't just beat Reform – they will beat the causes of Reform.
