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LITTLEWICK GREEN, England – Aged 22 and fresh out of college, George Blundell didn’t expect to win when he ran in the municipal election against the Conservative Party leader in an area loyal to the Tories. But for the young, enthusiastic, former student of politics it still seems worth taking.
“I was like, ‘Well, what’s stopping me’? It’s not something you have to do every day, is it?” recalled Mr. Blundell, a member of the centrist Liberal Democrats, when he sipped a beer outside the village pub where he once washed dishes as a summer job.
To his surprise, Mr Blundell is now a councilor representing the area around Littlewick Green, having defeated the powerful leader in the most likely of local elections that have sent shockwaves through the British Conservative Party.
Unhappy about Brexit and shocked by the economic chaos unleashed during Liz Truss’s short leadership last year, traditional Conservative voters are abandoning the party in the heartland of Britain’s prime, causing it to lose more than 1,000 municipal seats at the polls this month.
With a general election expected next year, which worries Prime Minister Rishi Sunak, who has earned solid marks as a problem solver and seems to have stopped the party’s bleeding from Ms Truss’ failure, but the party is still losing to the opposition. The Labor Party in the polls.
In the affluent areas of the reach of London – called “blue wall” after the color of the Conservative campaign – Liberal Democrats and greens, instead of Labor, made big gains in the local elections this month. But when the next general election comes around, voter defection from the Conservative Party could strip Mr Sunak of his parliamentary majority and drive the Labor leader, Keir Starmer, to Downing Street.
It could sweep away prominent Conservatives in Parliament – such as the chancellor of the Exchequer, Jeremy Hunt, and senior cabinet minister Michael Gove – who hold seats in the heart of the Conservative south, as well as former prime minister Theresa May, a member of Parliament. for Maidenhead.
According to Robert Ford, professor of political science at the University of Manchester, he is only to blame because many moderate Conservatives feel the party has abandoned them, rather than the other way around.
“The Conservative Party is about stable government and low taxes, and keeping the City of London,” he said, referring to the financial district where many voters live here. “This Conservative government has delivered nothing.”
“Rishi Sunak turned and said ‘Don’t worry, I know we’ve been burning down houses for five years, but someone who wasn’t the arsonist is now responsible,'” Professor Ford said. “Wow, not enough.”
Of course, not enough on Littlewick Green which, with its village pub, cricket pitch and pavilion flying the British flag, is an unlikely place for political rebellion.
However, to Mr Blundell’s success, as he joined around 200 people celebrating the coronation of King Charles III, he greeted the newly elected representative with spontaneous applause.
Mr Blundell, who works as a training consultant for an education company, said he was so shy that “I was literally a human tomato.” He added: “I’ve known everything for a long time, and I want to do well and help him – even if it’s the smallest thing.”
In the quintessential corner of Britain’s “blue walls,” Mr. Blundell lives with his siblings (he’s triplets) and his mother, a vicar, in a house that was once used as a set by the producers of “Midsomer Murders,” a TV detective show featuring gory crimes in the village Good English.
Mr Blundell attributed the victory to a combination of national politics, local factors and the satisfaction of local Conservatives. The count night was “spectacular,” he added.
Simon Werner, leader of the Liberal Democrats in Windsor and Maidenhead, thinks the success could be repeated in the general election. “The ‘blue wall’ is falling,” he said. “We have proven that we can do it locally and now we have to go ahead and do it in next year’s general election.”
In part, events here reflect the aftershocks of polarizing leader Boris Johnson, who won a general election victory in 2019 with the support of voters in the deindustrialized regions of northern and central England. But Mr. Johnson’s bombastic, pro-Brexit rhetoric, disdain for the business sector and focus on regenerating the north of England never endeared him to the moderate Conservatives in the south.
Most stuck with the Tories in 2019 because Labor was then led by the left wing, Jeremy Corbyn. But with the more centrist Mr Starmer now in charge, the prospect of a Labor government no longer scares many traditional Tories, freeing them to leave the Conservatives.
Professor Ford added that the Tories had been caricaturing and harassing their own supporters for years, with some Conservative politicians treating these voters as a privileged elite.
“If you keep telling people they’re not welcome, eventually they’ll get the message,” Professor Ford said.
Even some Conservative MPs have admitted to being worried by the Liberal Democrats’ appeal to these voters.
“Traditional moderate conservatives who are doing well in the world – who are happy to be in the EU because it works for them – yes, I am concerned about pulling them back from the Liberal Democrats,” said Steve Baker, a government minister. and the MP representing Wycombe, close to Windsor and Maidenhead.
There is also a demographic factor, as younger voters move away from London, a Labor stronghold, forced by high property prices.
But local issues are also important. At Maidenhead Golf Club, founded in 1896, there is anger as the Conservative-controlled municipality eases plans to build around 1,800 homes on 132 acres of land leased by the club – threatening to leave the club homeless.
Merv Foulds, the club’s former treasurer and lifelong Conservative voter, said that on election day he decided not to join his wife at the polling station, adding: “If only I hadn’t voted Tory.”
Locally and nationally, the Conservatives seem unreliable, he said, while Mr. Sunak has yet to prove persuasive.
“Sometimes, when he talks, you just feel like he’s talking to you,” said Mr. Foulds, the accountant. “At least with Boris, you get the feeling that he’s talking to you – even if he’s probably talking drivel, and maybe lying through his back teeth.”
In Woodlands Park, a less affluent district in Windsor and Maidenhead, Barbara Hatfield cleaner, said she had voted for several parties in the recent election but was worried about rising food prices and angry about development in the city centre.
“Maidenhead is horrible, it’s like Beirut,” he said of the city, where construction projects are underway, and he’s not sure how the general election will fare.
Another non-committal voter is Mr Blundell’s mother, Tina Molyneux, who serves in local churches as well as being head of discipleship and social justice in the Oxford diocese. He had his own theory as to why his son could win.
“Everybody said ‘There’s a change,'” he said. “There is something to do with youth and a new approach.”
Pdt. Molyneux said he had previously chosen Mrs. May, who is still respected, will not support him in the general election because the Conservatives have “moved to the right.”
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