United Kingdom

United Kingdomejpr_2045 1164..1174

RICHARD WHITAKERDepartment of Politics and International Relations, University of Leicester, UK

Table 1. Elections to the House of Commons

Date of election: 6 May 2010

Total number of seats: 650

Electorate: 45,597,461

Total votes cast: 29,991,471 (65.8%)

Total valid votes: 29,687,604 (99.0%)

Party

Number andpercentage

of votes

Changesince2005

Number andpercentage

of seats

Changesince2005

Conservative Party 10,703,654 (36.1) +3.7 306 (47.1) +96

Labour Party 8,606,517 (29.0) -6.2 258 (39.7) -90

Liberal Democrats 6,836,248 (23.0) +1.0 57 (8.8) -5

United KingdomIndependence Party

919,471 (3.1) +0.9 0 (0.0) 0

British National Party 564,321 (1.9) +1.2 0 (0.0) 0

Scottish National Party 491,386 (1.7) +0.1 6 (0.9) 0

Green Party 285,612 (1.0) -0.1 1 (0.2) +1

Independent 182,299 (0.6) +0.2 1 (0.2) 0

Sinn Fein 171,942 (0.6) -0.1 5 (0.8) 0

Democratic UnionistParty

168,216 (0.6) -0.3 8 (1.2) -1

Plaid Cymru 165,394 (0.6) -0.1 3 (0.5) +1

Social Democratic andLabour Party

110,970 (0.4) -0.1 3 (0.5) 0

Ulster Conservativesand Unionists

102,361 (0.3) -0.1 0 (0.0) -1

English Democrats 64,826 (0.2) +0.2 0 (0.0) 0

Alliance Party 42,762 (0.1) 0.0 1 (0.2) +1

Others/Speaker 271,625 (0.9) -0.4 1 (0.2) -2

1164 European Journal of Political Research 50: 1164–1174, 2011doi: 10.1111/j.1475-6765.2011.02045.x

© 2011 The Author(s)European Journal of Political Research © 2011 European Consortium for Political ResearchPublished by Blackwell Publishing Ltd., 9600 Garsington Road, Oxford, OX4 2DQ, UK and 350 Main Street, Malden,MA 02148, USA

Table 2. Cabinet composition of Brown I

A. The party composition of Brown I:

Date of investiture: 27 June 2007

PartyNumber and percentage of

parliamentary seatsNumber and percentage

of cabinet posts

Labour Party 349a (54.0) 23 (100.0)

B. Cabinet members of Brown I:

For the composition of Brown I on 1 January 2010, see Whitaker (2010: 1194).

Note: a This figure refers to 1 January 2010. The number of Labour seats fell to 345 by thetime Parliament was dissolved before the general election due to the death of one LabourMP and the whip being removed from three others over the expenses scandal.

Table 3. Cabinet composition of Cameron I

A. The party composition of Cameron I:

Date of investiture: 19 May 2010

PartyNumber and percentageof parliamentary seats

Number and percentageof cabinet posts

Conservative Party 306 (47.1) 18 (78.3)

Liberal Democrats 57 (8.8) 5 (21.7)

B. Cabinet members of Cameron I:

Prime Minister, First Lord of the Treasury and Minister for the Civil Service: DavidCameron (1966 male, Conservative)

Deputy Prime Minster, Lord President of the Council with special responsibility forpolitical and constitutional reform: Nick Clegg (1967 male, Liberal Democrat)

Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs: William Hague (1961 male,Conservative)

Chancellor of the Exchequer: George Osborne (1971 male, Conservative)

Lord Chancellor and Secretary of State for Justice: Kenneth Clarke (1940 male,Conservative)

Secretary of State for the Home Department and Minister for Women and Equalities:Theresa May (1956 female, Conservative)

Secretary of State for Defence: Liam Fox (1961 male, Conservative)

Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills, and President of the Board ofTrade: Vince Cable (1943 male, Liberal Democrat)

Secretary of State for Work and Pensions: Iain Duncan Smith (1954 male,Conservative)

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© 2011 The Author(s)European Journal of Political Research © 2011 European Consortium for Political Research

Table 3. Continued.

Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change: Chris Huhne (1954 male, LiberalDemocrat)

Secretary of State for Health: Andrew Lansley (1956 male, Conservative)

Secretary of State for Education: Michael Gove (1967 male, Conservative)

Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government: Eric Pickles (1952 male,Conservative)

Secretary of State for Transport: Philip Hammond (1955 male, Conservative)

Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs: Caroline Spelman (1958female, Conservative)

Secretary of State for International Development: Andrew Mitchell (1956 male,Conservative)

Secretary of State for Culture, Olympics, Media and Sport: Jeremy Hunt (1966 male,Conservative)

Secretary of State for Northern Ireland: Owen Paterson (1956 male, Conservative)

Secretary of State for Scotland: Danny Alexander (1972 male, Liberal Democrat)

Secretary of State for Wales: Cheryl Gillan (1952 female, Conservative)

Leader of the House of Lords: Lord Strathclyde (1960 male, Conservative)

Chief Secretary to the Treasury: David Laws (1965 male, Liberal Democrat)

Minister without Portfolio: Baroness Warsi (1971 female, Conservative)

Changes on 29 May 2010:

Chief Secretary to the Treasury: David Laws (1965 male, Liberal Democrat) resignedand was replaced by Danny Alexander (1972 male, Liberal Democrat)

Secretary of State for Scotland: Danny Alexander was replaced by Michael Moore(1965 male, Liberal Democrat)

Table 4. Composition of the House of Lords (upper house)

Party January 2009 January 2010 January 2011

Labour 216 211 233

Conservative 198 189 204

Liberal Democrat 72 72 83

Cross-benchers 206 183 182

Bishops 26 26 25

Others 14 25 26

Total 732 706 753

Note: These figures exclude members on leave of absence and those disqualified as seniormembers of the judiciary or as Members of the European Parliament.Source: House of Lords Information Office.

1166 richard whitaker


Issues in national politics and election results

British politics in 2010 was dominated by a general election campaign thateffectively began early in the year, and the subsequent formation of the firstcoalition government in the United Kingdom since the Second World War.Debates about how best to deal with the continuing economic malaise featuredheavily throughout the year.The election campaign had seen the first televisedleaders’ debates in Britain, out of which Liberal Democrat leader Nick Cleggemerged with a much higher profile but only a modest increase in vote share forhis party. Once the novelty of putting together a coalition administration hadworn off, attention in the second half of 2010 focused on the Government’sprogramme of spending cuts and constitutional reform as well as the LabourParty leadership election.The year came to an end with a controversial decisionto allow university tuition fees to be raised to £9,000, and Vince Cable findinghimself in hot water after undercover journalists recorded him discussing hisimportance within the coalition and his views of Rupert Murdoch.

The year began with the re-appearance of a theme from 2009 (Whitaker2010): attempts to oust Gordon Brown from office. On 6 January, two formercabinet ministers, Geoff Hoon and Patricia Hewitt, called for a secret ballot onthe leadership of the Labour Party. Although Foreign Secretary David Mili-band’s support for Brown was rather tardy and lukewarm, Hoon and Hewitt’scampaign failed to gather sufficient momentum for a ballot to go ahead. Thiswas an inauspicious start to the year for the Prime Minister, but a Populus pollin The Times, a week later showed his ratings to be on the increase.

While the economy came out of recession in the final quarter of 2009,questions of how to reduce public spending were to dominate the politicalagenda in the opening months of 2010. Economic conditions remained fragilewith slightly lower growth in the first three months of the year compared withthe last quarter of 2009. In his final budget, on 24 March, Labour ChancellorAlistair Darling predicted growth of 1–1.25 per cent for 2010 and lowered theforecast for economic expansion in 2011. His attempts to stimulate economicactivity included cuts in business rates for one year and dropping stamp dutyfor homes up to £250,000 for first-time buyers for two years. In April, Officefor National Statistics figures showed government borrowing at a record highof £163.4 billion for the 2009/2010 financial year. The second quarter of 2010saw unexpectedly high economic growth of 1.2 per cent, but the economy wasto contract again in the final quarter.

The expenses scandal, which had been a major theme in 2009 (Whitaker2010), continued to make headlines with the publication in February of SirThomas Legg’s report on MPs’ expenses. The report required £1.12 million ofrepayments of claims made on second homes – a figure lower than it would

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have been in the absence of appeals made by parliamentarians. February alsosaw the announcement that three Labour MPs (Elliot Morley, Jim Devine andDavid Chaytor) and one Conservative peer (Lord Hanningfield) would becharged with false accounting over their expenses claims. Labour removed thewhip from the three MPs as did the Conservatives from Lord Hanningfield.Chaytor pleaded guilty to three counts of false accounting in December, buttrials for the others did not take place until 2011.

Campaigning for the election began early in the year with the publicationon 4 January of a Conservative draft manifesto on health policy alongside aposter campaign stating that the National Health Service would be the party’s‘number one priority’. Labour responded with the publication ConservativeTax and Spending Policies setting out an alleged £34 billion gap in Conserva-tive spending plans. In early February, Brown attempted to gain the initiativeon constitutional reform by saying he would introduce legislation before theelection allowing a referendum on the alternative vote (AV) system for elec-tions to Westminster seats.This was to remain on the political agenda well into2011, having been taken on as part of the Conservative–Liberal Democratcoalition agreement (discussed below). Later in February Brown launchedLabour’s campaign themes under the slogan ‘A future fair for all’, but this wasto be over-shadowed by the publication of Andrew Rawnsley’s (2010) book,The End of the Party, which included allegations that Brown had behavedabusively towards staff. Despite this, the earlier attempt to oust Brown and thecharging of three Labour MPs over expenses, the gap between the two mainparties in the polls broadly declined over the opening months of the year, withseveral polls in February showing only a six-point lead for the Conservatives,which was not enough to ensure a majority in Parliament. Polling data alsoshowed Cameron’s lead over Brown having halved in the five months up toFebruary (www.politicshome.com, 19 February 2010).

On 6 April, Gordon Brown called an election for 6 May.The first week of theofficial campaign was dominated by discussion of Labour’s planned increase innational insurance payments, its merits as a way of raising government revenueand its potential effect on jobs.The second week saw the main parties launchingtheir manifestos. Labour’s document, ‘A future fair for all’, concentrated onthree themes: rebuilding the economy, protecting public services and strength-ening society, and ‘a new politics’. On the first of these, Labour promised toreduce the government deficit by more than half over four years but not to begincuts until 2011/2012 – a crucial difference from the Conservative position. Onthe second theme,‘frontline spending’ on childcare, schools, the NHS and policewould be protected from cuts, and public services were to become morepersonalised. On ‘new politics’, in addition to a referendum on AV, Labourpromised fixed-term parliaments and moves towards a written constitution.



The Conservative manifesto was billed as an ‘Invitation to join the govern-ment of Britain’, based around the theme of moving from big government to‘the Big Society’. The latter included ideas about empowering citizens andtheir communities, and encouraging greater social responsibility. For instance,parents would be able to set up schools, local residents could take over therunning of libraries and the police should be more accountable to citizens.The ‘Big Society’ proved hard to sell and was to feature less prominently as thecampaign proceeded. On the economy, the party promised to increase spend-ing on health annually in real terms and to maintain spending commitments oninternational development. At the same time they would immediately begincutting public spending overall with the aim of removing ‘the bulk’ of thedeficit before the next election. On reform of politics, the Conservatives prom-ised to cut the number of MPs, make constituency sizes more equal, introducerecall of MPs convicted of wrongdoing and retain the first-past-the-post elec-toral system. Other themes included a commitment to protect the environ-ment, and a policy towards the European Union (EU) based on referenda overany further transfer of powers alongside legislation explicitly setting out thesovereignty of the United Kingdom Parliament.

The Liberal Democrats’ manifesto, under the title ‘Change that works foryou’, set out their plans under four headings: fair taxes, a fair chance for everychild, a fair future (creating jobs with a green economy) and a fair deal, basedon reform of politics. On the first of these, the party promised to raise thethreshold on which income tax is levied to £10,000, paid for partly by a tax onproperties worth more than £2 million, quickly dubbed a ‘mansion tax’ by partsof the media.They set out plans to cut government spending, like Labour, from2011/2012 rather than immediately after an election.They chose not to protectthe budgets of any particular departments but said they had no plans to makenet cuts in frontline NHS spending.Their ‘fair chance for every child’ promisedfinancial support for the most disadvantaged school children. On the thirdtheme they set out a green stimulus plan to create 100,000 jobs. On politicalreform they promised the single transferable vote (STV) for Westminsterelections, and, as did the Conservatives, cuts to the number of MPs and a recallsystem for MPs found to have engaged in ‘serious wrongdoing’. Like Labour,they also promised fixed-term parliaments.

Differences between the three main parties were therefore mainly aboutwhen to begin spending cuts, how far they should go and how much protectionshould be afforded to specific public services.

Much of the election campaign that followed was dominated by the threetelevised leaders’ debates which took place weekly from the 15 April. The firstof these was the most talked about as, unexpectedly, Nick Clegg was the clearwinner in terms of his performance, dealing more comfortably with the format,

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at least initially, than Cameron.The associated surge in support for the LiberalDemocrats shown in opinion polls was not reflected in the election result butthe profile of the party and its leader rose, affecting the tone of the followingtwo debates, with much more media attention having been given to the LiberalDemocrats’ policies and to Clegg himself. The content of the debates focusedmainly on domestic policy (Allen et al. 2011), which fitted with the salience ofthe economy during the election campaign. A day before the final debate,Brown was to find himself in the news for all the wrong reasons. The PrimeMinister was recorded, via a microphone accidentally left on, describing awoman he had just met during a visit to Rochdale as ‘bigoted’ on the basis ofremarks she made about immigrants. While he attempted to brush this off inthe final debate, opinion polls showed him in third place in all three leaders’debates.

The results of the election, in which no main party achieved an overallmajority, were something of a mixed bag for all three of them. The Conserva-tives managed a 3.7-point increase in vote share and achieved a net gain of 96seats, making them the largest party but short of a majority by 20 seats. Labourmade a net loss of 90 seats and dropped 6.2 points in vote share. The LiberalDemocrats gained a point in share of the vote, but made a net loss of five seats,which was particularly disappointing for them, especially after their pollingfigures had soared earlier in the campaign. After the three main parties, theUnited Kingdom Independence Party was next with 3.1 per cent of the vote –the highest score for a fourth-placed party since 1950, and roughly one pointup on its vote share at the previous general election.This did not translate intoany seats in Parliament, but the Green Party, with much more geographicallyconcentrated support, won their first seat with a victory in the constituencyof Brighton Pavilion. The radical right British National Party (BNP) alsomanaged to increase their vote share by 1.2 points to 1.9 per cent but withoutwinning a seat. The share of the vote for parties other than the main three wasthe highest in Great Britain since the nineteenth century (Curtice 2010: 627),reflecting changes in the party system.

In Northern Ireland the most dramatic result was that of Peter Robinson,leader of the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP), losing his seat along with adecline of nearly nine points in vote share for the party. The DUP’s loss was tobe the non-sectarian Alliance Party’s gain. The alliance between the UlsterUnionists and Conservatives, known as ‘Ulster Conservatives and UnionistsNew Force’, failed to win a seat, as did the Traditional Unionist Voice – abreakaway group from the DUP. Sinn Féin moved into first place but, alongwith the Social Democratic and Labour Party, maintained its number of seats.A further seat was won by Lady Sylvia Hermon, an independent and formerUlster Unionist MP.



It took five days from 7 May for the first coalition government in the UnitedKingdom since 1945 to be put together. The day after the election saw talksbegin between the Conservatives and Liberal Democrats. By 10 May GordonBrown announced he would resign as Labour Party leader and the Conserva-tives offered a coalition to the Liberal Democrats. The following evening,Brown resigned as Prime Minister and the agreement of a Conservative–Liberal Democrat coalition became public. The Liberal Democrats were per-ceived to have done well out of the deal, achieving the Cabinet posts of DeputyPrime Minister, Secretaries of State for Business, Energy and Climate Change,and Scotland, as well as the Chief Secretary to the Treasury. In policy terms,both parties succeeded in areas that were of importance to them, althoughcutting the deficit was to take priority over all other measures, reflecting theConservatives’ concern to begin reducing government expenditure as soon aspracticable. The Liberal Democrats gained a referendum on a change to theAV system for Westminster elections, while the Conservatives ensured thatreducing the deficit, a tough immigration policy, Euroscepticism and strongdefence were part of the agreement, although there were modifications andsome dilution of the position on relations with the European Union (Quinnet al. 2011).The first opinion polls taken after the new government was formedshowed a slight drop in support for the Liberal Democrats – something thatwas to continue through the rest of the year – and a rise in support for Labour,with the Conservatives remaining static.

The coalition was rocked early in its life by the resignation on 29 May ofDavid Laws, Chief Secretary to the Treasury, a Liberal Democrat and one ofthe key players in brokering the coalition deal (Laws 2010).The expenses sagahad reared its head again as Laws admitted having claimed £40,000 in rent,paid to his partner. But life for the coalition went on with an emergency budgeton 22 June. Value Added Tax was to rise from 17.5 to 20 per cent and spendingwas to be cut with measures including a two-year freeze on public sector pay,a three-year freeze in child benefit and reduced tax credits for families earningmore than £40,000. A £1,000 rise in the income tax threshold was also prom-ised. Details of how public expenditure would be cut were set out in theGovernment’s Spending Review in October.This established that a little underhalf a million public sector jobs would go in the period up to 2015 along withaverage spending cuts per department of 19 per cent. The Government stuckto the Conservative promise of increased expenditure on health while fundingto the police was to be cut by 4 per cent per year.

Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg set out the Government’s proposals forconstitutional reform in July, including plans for a referendum on 5 May 2011on changing the voting system for Westminster elections to AV, a review ofconstituency boundaries and corresponding reduction in the number of MPs to

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600, and the introduction of fixed-term parliaments. By the end of the year,the Fixed Term Parliaments Bill had completed its committee stage in theCommons while the legislation providing for a referendum on AV and areduction in the number of MPs had passed through the Commons and startedwhat was to be a lengthy period of scrutiny in the upper chamber.

While the opposition among Government backbenchers to these constitu-tional bills was limited, the Government was to experience a much bumpierride when Parliament passed legislation in early December to raise the cap onuniversity tuition fees to £9,000 per year.The vote had been preceded by majorprotests in several cities across Britain, including sit-ins by students on univer-sity premises. It was particularly difficult for the Liberal Democrats as all oftheir MPs had signed a pledge, prior to the election, promising not to increasetuition fees in the next Parliament – something that was also promised in theirmanifesto. However, the Government agreed to a policy of increasing the cap,on the basis of recommendations in the Browne Report on the future of highereducation in England, set up under the previous government and published inOctober. The Government’s majority was cut to 21, with 21 Liberal DemocratMPs (37 per cent) voting against the motion – the largest rebellion against theleadership in the party’s history. By the end of the year, and no doubt partlyrelated to this, the Liberal Democrats were scoring around 9–11 per cent inmost polls, around half the level of support they were receiving just prior to thegeneral election.

The second half of the year also saw a Labour Party leadership election. Formuch of the campaign, which ran from June to September, David Miliband,towards the right of his party and a Foreign Secretary in Gordon Brown’sGovernment, was expected to win. Under the alternative vote system used forthe election, he was ahead until the final round of re-distributing preferences,at which point his brother Ed, perceived to be more left-wing, won by a smallmargin. This surprising result saw David Miliband leaving frontline Britishpolitics, fearing that taking a place in Ed’s shadow cabinet would lead tofrequent media speculation about differences between the brothers. Ed Mili-band supported cutting the deficit but more slowly than proposed by theGovernment, promised to make his the party of enterprise and small business,favoured a ‘living wage’ and declared his opposition to the Iraq War, promisingforeign policy based on values, not just alliances. As 2010 came to an end,Labour were scoring around 39–41 per cent in opinion polls, many of whichgave them a lead of around two points over the Conservatives. Much ofLabour’s gain had been at the expense of the Liberal Democrats.

On foreign policy, in July the Government stated its aim that, by 2014,British troops should operate only in a training capacity in Afghanistan. Theyalso published a National Security Strategy on 19 October setting out major



threats including cyber attack and terrorism. This was followed by publicationof the Strategic Defence and Security Review which established plans for an 8per cent cut in defence spending over four years, involving the loss of 42,000jobs in the Ministry of Defence and armed services over the same period.

In Scottish developments, legislation implementing many of the recom-mendations of the Calman Commission (Whitaker 2010: 1198) began itspassage through Westminster in late November. This would give the ScottishExecutive a smaller budget from London but much more power to set incometax rates, with the aim of increasing the Executive’s accountability to Scottishvoters. The bill would also devolve powers to Scotland in a number of newareas, including speed limits and drink-driving laws.

In Wales, the National Assembly passed a motion in February that eventu-ally led to a referendum in 2011 on granting direct legislative powers to theAssembly.

In Northern Ireland, First Minister Peter Robinson stood down from hispost for six weeks from 11 January following allegations about his wife’sprivate life and the couple’s financial affairs. He returned in February after anenquiry found no evidence he had departed from the ministerial code. Thesame month also saw an announcement that the Irish National LiberationArmy, the Official Irish Republican Army and the Ulster Defence Associationhad decommissioned their weapons.After a long and difficult process of reach-ing agreement among the parties, policing and justice powers were devolved tothe Northern Ireland Assembly on 12 April with the Alliance party leader,David Ford, taking up the relevant ministerial post. On 15 June, the report ofthe Saville Inquiry into ‘Bloody Sunday’ (30 January 1972), when Britishsoldiers killed a number of civilians in Derry/Londonderry, was finally pub-lished after more than a decade of investigation. The findings, which indicatedthat those killed were unarmed, led David Cameron to issue a formal apologyfor the deaths.

Institutional changes

The coalition government created a new Office for Budgetary Responsibilityin May, the role of which is to provide independent analysis of the UnitedKingdom’s economy and public finances, and to measure how far the govern-ment is meeting its fiscal aims. Changes to the standing orders of the House ofCommons in March allowed, for the first time, the election by secret ballot ofthe chairs and members of select committees.The aim was to reduce the powerof party whips over the membership of these committees and thereforeincrease their independence from government. Elections to the committees

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took place in June when the Commons also changed its rules to allow theestablishment of a Backbench Business Committee, which was elected by theend of the month. This has responsibility for scheduling non-government busi-ness, including legislation and debates, on 35 days a year.

Acknowledgements

I am grateful to Ben Clements for detailed comments on a draft of this articleand to the House of Lords Information Office for providing data on thecomposition of the upper house.

Sources and further information

Publications:

Allen, N., Bara, J. & Bartle J. (2011). A Much Debated Campaign. In Allen, N. &Bartle, J. (eds) Britain at the Polls 2010. London: Sage.

Curtice, J. (2010). So What Went Wrong with the Electoral System? The 2010 Election Resultand the Debate About Electoral Reform. Parliamentary Affairs 63(4): 623–38.

Laws, D. (2010). 22 Days in May: The Birth of the Lib Dem-Conservative Coalition. London:Biteback.

Quinn, T., Bara, J. & Bartle, J. (2011). The UK Coalition Agreement of 2010: Who Won?Journal of Elections Public Opinion and Parties 21(2): 295–312.

Rawnsley, A. (2010). The End of the Party. London: Viking.Whitaker, R. (2010). United Kingdom. European Journal of Political Research 49(7–8):

1193–1202.

On the Internet:

BBC News: http://news.bbc.co.ukHouse of Commons Library research papers (election results): www.parliament.uk/

parliamentary_publications_and_archives/research_papers.cfmHouse of Commons standard notes: www.parliament.uk/business/publications/research/

standard-notes/House of Lords (composition): www.parliament.uk/mps-lords-and-offices/lords/lords-by-

type-and-party/MPs’ voting behaviour: www.revolts.co.ukPolitics Home (political news): www.politicshome.comUnited Kingdom Polling Report (polling and commentary): http://ukpollingreport.co.uk/

blogUniversity College London, Constitution Unit, Newsletter (constitutional changes and

developments in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland): www.ucl.ac.uk/constitution-unit/publications



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