GE Updates #3: Welcome to Canada

Will the 2024 election result in the destruction of the Tories as seen in the 1993 Canadian election?

The Conservatives have endured a horrendous week. Farage’s announcement that he is standing as leader of Reform, mixed with Sunak’s D-Day catastrophe, have posed an existential threat to the party’s vote. For the first time since the 2015 election there is a likelihood of a complete split in the right-wing vote. The implications point towards electoral annihilation for the Conservatives, and in the worst scenario finishing behind the Lib Dems, who would become the official opposition. A result of this kind would have a striking resemblance to the 1993 Canadian election in which the Tory party was wiped out. But is this likely, and what are the political machinations which cause party-ending landslides such as Canada 1993? 

Canada and the Right

The 1993 Canadian election is remembered by many as the wipeout election – a nightmare parties never want to envisage. That night the Progressive Conservative Party, led by Prime Minister Kim Campbell, was reduced to 2 seats (from 156) in one fell swoop, with their vote share plummeting from 43% to 16%. Campbell lost her seat while the party finished last in seat totals, even losing their ‘official party status’ – which requires a party to win at least 12 seats in the House. 

One cause of the collapse was Preston Manning’s Reform Party (yes, they were actually called Reform) which stood as a right-wing populist party. Reform managed to split the Conservative vote reaching a remarkable 18.7% (up from 2% in 1988) and a total of 52 seats – two seats away from becoming the official opposition. The party was anti-immigration, socially conservative and advocated for a smaller state with populist tax cuts, something not too dissimilar from the UK Reform party of today. 

What fascinates many about Canada ‘93 is the scale of punishment the electorate dished out after 9 years of Tory rule. Campbell’s predecessor, Mulroney, had become deeply unpopular after overseeing the failure of a referendum on the Charlottetown Accords – which was an attempt to reconcile the different states’ sovereignty, triggering a political rebellion of the Quebec region through Bloc Québécois, accelerating the party towards the status of official opposition with 13.5% of the vote. The Canadian Tories were also held responsible for the 1990s downturn in the economy which hampered several governments across the democratic West. In addition, Campbell’s campaign was gaffe-filled and poorly run, with many attributing the scale of wipeout to the PM and her team.

Without making too much of a superficial connection, the conditions for a Tory wipeout in Canada have interesting similarities for this election: a failed national referendum leading to the resignation of an unpopular leader (Brexit and Cameron), a populist-right party splitting the vote in a First Past the Post system (Reform), regionalised constitutional politics denying the Tories seats (Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland), an economic downturn which the government is blamed for (2022 onwards) and a Tory campaign poorly run (look at this last week!). In effect, the election, like Canada ‘93, is shaping up to be the perfect storm for the right.

Obviously Canadian politics doesn’t translate into UK politics easily, nor do historical trends determine the present. But with several recent polls showing the Conservative vote splintering since the D-Day mess and Farage’s announcement – the prospect of a wipeout is now a distinct possibility. So what are the mechanics behind a landslide defeat?

The Causes of a Landslide

There is no general consensus on how landslides occur, partly because measuring the motives behind destroying a party’s vote is rarely attempted – likely because it's something that only becomes visible after the result. However,

Jonn Elledge

, has created an intriguing seven-point test for landslides. For parties to survive, chiefly in bad / end of cycle elections, they must retain several of the motivations to retain enough of their core vote. They read as follows:

1. My party is good for the country
2. Their party is bad for the country
3. My party is good for me
4. My party looks like me
5. Everyone else like me is voting for them
6. Habit
7. There is no alternative

Elledge argues that all seven of these motivations for voting Tory no longer exist for their previous voters. Below is a quick paraphrasing of each of his points:

On ‘My party is good for the country’ – the last 14 years of poor delivery and governance, especially concerning economic policy, destroys this point. ‘Their party is bad for the country’ – Starmer’s ming vase strategy of not being scary or deeply unpopular, compared to Corbyn, has nullified the anti-Labour motivation vote. The ‘My party is good for me’ has been very successful over the last 14 years with policies targeted at, as Elledge states, “older, socially conservative, home owning and retired”. But the recent cost of living crisis and decline in NHS standards has damaged what these voters experience and use, while interest rate rises and lack of house-building has hurt the conditions for creating more of these secure homeowners. ‘My party looks like me’ – from sleaze scandals (partygate etc) to Liz Truss, the Tory party is no longer listening to (and therefore looking like) middle England. The party has become ideologically charged, morally callous and confused.


‘Everyone else like me is voting for them’ is also no longer true either. With over 1.3m of the 2019 Tory vote dead, and as low as 8% of under 50s planning to vote Conservative, large social groupings have moved away from voting Tory. In short, it's hard for many to find people like them who are voting Tory. The ‘Habit’ of voting Tory may be difficult to reignite due to the Johnson-Cummings-Brexit shift towards Northern ex-Labour voters, rather than the traditional southern blue strongholds (and also the sandcastle theory). This alienation has dissuaded many with a habit of voting Tory to return to the party. The final motivation, uniquely strong in FPTP systems, is ‘There is no alternative’ – but Farage’s announcement and Reform’s strong organisation to stand 609 candidates has shattered this. There is now a right-wing alternative with growing political support which is posing potent questions of the Tories viability within a changing UK political system. 

While Elledge is broadly correct on these main points, most notably 1-4, it's still debatable if the last three points will be reached by the end of the campaign. Landslides are usually very hard to call until you see the votes on the night – small things can tip many at the last moment. My core concern out of these seven tests is therefore ‘Habit’. A lot of recent trends and data would point towards the disintegration of habit (or historical voting intention / party identification). Voters are markedly more volatile; changing their voting intention much more which leads to a fragmentation of the party system. But old habits die hard, and the critical mass of support that Farage’s party will need to reach to trigger point 5 and point 7 (of actually winning seats or having enough of one’s socio-political group to trigger a broad shift to Reform) is quite high. With that said, and as I noted in a piece almost a year ago, the route Reform is taking is the only viable route that could kill the Tory party:

“Once the facade of Tory power is destroyed [a] new right-wing party could seek to replace their vote share – or even campaign on a platform of PR. The cost of running 600+ candidates is enormous, while the nuclear-style tactics of destroying the right wing vote and enabling a huge Labour majority would be incredibly difficult to pull off, but is absolutely possible under FPTP. In fact, it's arguably easier to kill the Conservative party under FPTP than PR due to the brutal impact of vote splitting (spoiler effect).”

This brutal impact of vote splitting may be about to materialise in the form of Canada ‘93. However, polling is very untested on the Reform vote. In addition, there have never been two multi-issue right-wing parties standing in almost all seats at an election (UKIP’s single issue appeal makes them different to Reform). The broader offer and appeal of Reform will trigger larger, more complex questions for voters. Thus many torn between the Tories and Reform could flit between the two over the last few weeks, with their final decision made in the final days or hours. And this is where point 6 comes in – I think it will be really hard for many traditional Conservatives, not just in the south, to pull the lever which could permanently kill the party they have voted for their entire life. Whether these thoughts are actually going through people’s heads as they vote is dubious – but one change in the Tory machine makes me think they will. 

The Tories have shifted their campaign away from attempting to win over 250 seats towards limiting the majority Labour will achieve. After a terrible start to the campaign, this is probably the best strategy they can pursue with the path-dependency they are now on: namely, an all but assured Labour victory due to a cascading effect of the last 14 years and current party politics / failed tactics. I’ve been consistently arguing that ‘there is more likely to be a Corbyn style recovery forcing a hung parliament’ rather than a 1992 shock win for the Tories. Even this prediction looks misplaced now, but the point of 2017 is worth exploring. The shift to the survival strategy is highly embarrassing for the Tories, but it is one that will elicit sympathy with their core voters. This worked extremely well for Labour in 2017 when Corbyn, facing electoral wipeout, regained many traditional Labour voters who were happier sticking with their ‘habit’ because they knew there was no chance Corbyn would become PM. To vote Labour became essentially guilt (and risk) free – and voters will always go for this option if it's available. The fact that this almost accidentally caused a Labour government is worth remembering.

The Tory strategy shift will place the question of complete annihilation at the heart of voters' minds as they cast their ballots, while also beginning to demonise the Labour vote more (triggering point 2 slightly) with the possibility of one of the largest majorities ever (200-400+) ensuring an ‘elected dictatorship’ for Starmer. However, early evidence suggests this could have the opposite effect, with 13% of Tory 2019 voters actively wanting the party to be reduced to zero seats. The other question, which will have an increasing salience, as is evident in this survey, is that voters both 1. Want (and understand) there needs to be an effective opposition while 2. Are not sure if that opposition should be the Tories – but how many of those 2019 Tories actually want a different opposition, let alone know how they could achieve this, is questionable, particularly considering Reform’s inability to become the opposition (unlike in Canada ‘93).

Current Mood: Existential

The fact that the Tory strategy has shifted to ‘survive’ in week three of a snap election which they called themselves is almost unbelievable. Most Labour officials and MPs would have snapped your hand off if offered a 75+ majority at the start of the campaign, with many expecting polls to tighten.

The prospect of a Canada ‘93 is now plausible with another populist right-wing party potentially splitting the right wing vote. The repercussions this could have on right-wing politics is existential; in Canada the right were split for three successive elections over eleven years, resulting in several easy victories for the Liberal left. However, it is too early to assuredly predict the destruction of the Tory party – three weeks can change a lot. One thing is certain: the future is extremely bleak for the Conservative Party.

Tom Egerton is a political writer and researcher, his upcoming book ‘The Conservative Effect 2010-24: 14 Wasted Years?’ is out on 27 June 2024, published by CUP and co-edited with Anthony Seldon. Follow him on X / Twitter here.