Whatever the result at the ballot box, the 2010 General Election will fundamentally alter the face of British politics. Climate change, the banking crisis, social media and even duck houses and bell towers all shaped the political landscape in 2009. So what lies ahead for 2010?
1997 saw the largest number of MPs standing down since the 1945 election, with 117 MPs retiring. In 2010, this record will be smashed with some commentators predicting that nearly 200 MPs will hang up their boots – almost a third of the House. A huge influx of new blood is bound to impact on politics – the new intake will be younger, more diverse and more technologically savvy. But some, such as Professor Phil Cowley, argue that we will have a House of Commons which is a lot less willing to challenge the government. Campaigners may have to work a lot harder to spur new MPs to rock the boat and challenge the party line.
At the same time, campaigners may also have to dig a little deeper in order to gauge MPs views. Allegiance to a political party may not be the shorthand it was once was for understanding their world view. Jonathan Isaby from ConservativeHome estimates that almost 20% of Conservative Prospective Parliamentary Candidates will previously have been candidates for other political parties and it’s likely that the trend will continue towards a rise in independent candidates.
The campaigning environment also looks set for some major shifts, the growth of consumer action, the rise of more fluid activism, the impact of social media, an increase in competition and coalitions, and the ‘professionalisation’ of campaigns staff will all impact on the way campaigners interact with politicians.
To take just one example, Tom Watson MP argues that the essence of social media is the ability to very easily form groups with low barriers to entry. While its not clear how social media will influence the forthcoming general election, its importance cannot be denied. As a recent piece in the Guardian notes; at the last election “social networking sites were known to few. Facebook was largely unheard of and Twitter had yet to be invented. YouTube had been in existence for only three months. Blogs were in their infancy and political bloggers, now hugely influential in the flow of news, had yet to evolve.”
This, combined with current trends towards greater transparency, open government and the cross-party drive towards greater localism may mean that some of the old orthodoxies may be challenged – large national campaigning organisations will have to compete with smaller looser networks of activists able to mobilise quickly and gain access and influence over Parliamentarians.
To help respond to these challenges, NCVO is launching a new kind of conference for a new kind of politics. Share your thoughts. Get involved online. Pop along if you can.
Chloe is Parliamentary Officer at NCVO.
