Prof Maria Sobolewska
Professor of Political Science at the University of Manchester and works on the political behaviour and representation of ethnic minorities in Britain and in a comparative perspective, public perceptions of ethnicity, immigrants and integration.
Email: maria.sobolewska@manchester.ac.uk
UK Election 2024
Section 1: Democracy and representation
1. Public anxiety and the electoral process (Prof Barry Richards)
2. How Nigel Farage opened the door to No. 10 for Keir Starmer (Prof Pippa Norris)
3. The performance of the electoral system (Prof Alan Renwick)
4. Tory downfall is democracy rectifying its mistakes (Prof Stephen Barber)
5. Votes at 16 and decent citizenship education could create a politically aware generation (Dr Ben Kisby, Dr Lee Jerome)
6. “An election about us but not for us”: the lack of communication for young people during GE2024 (Dr James Dennis)
7. Election timing: masterstroke or risky gamble? (Prof Sarah Birch)
8. The dog that didn’t bark? Electoral integrity and administration from voter ID to postal votes (Prof Alistair Clark)
9. A political gamble? How licit and illicit betting permeated the campaign (Dr Matthew Wall)
10. Ethnic diversity in politics is the new normal in Britain (Prof Maria Sobolewska)
11. Bullshit and Lies on the campaign trail: do party campaigns reflect the post-truth age? (Prof Darren Lilleker)
12. Stoking the culture wars: the risks of a more hostile form of polarised politics (Dr Jen Birks)
With an all-change election, it is very telling that the one result that did not hinge on whether the polls predicting a Labour landslide were right has been that ethnic diversity of Members of Parliament went up again. An early report on ethnicity of candidates at this General Election from British Future showed that all possible election results would have ended with an increase in the number of non-White MPs. As it happens, on the night, an estimated record 89 were elected, up from 65. This, for the first time, makes political representation of an approximately 14 percent non-White British voters numerically perfect.
The election also marked a very important symbolic moment in British political history, by returning an ethnic minority MP from a constituency associated by name with the infamous, openly racist, election campaign in 1964 General Election: Smethwick. That this seat is represented by a Sikh MP winning an election held exactly 60 years later, is truly a symbol of how far we have come in political representation of ethnic minorities. Another memorable moment came with Wales electing their very first non-White MP, Kanishka Narayan.
One of the reasons for this pre-determined outcome is that another historic rise in ethnic diversity among MPs is a continuation of a long-term trend. Since the 2010 election, where the virtual monopoly of Labour in representing minority voters was finally broken, both Labour and Conservatives have increased the numbers of ethnic minority MPs at each election.
This steady progress has been a result of central parties’ commitment to having a more diverse slate of MPs as result of a damning Speaker’s Conference 2008 Report on diversity in Parliament. Media scrutiny on ethnicity of candidates and elected officials increased, and both Labour and the Conservatives worked to increase the numbers of ethnic minority MPs elected, achieving a doubling in numbers in 2010 and similar rises at each election since. This has been largely achieved through both parties putting minority candidates in more safe and winnable seats, and in a wider variety of seats, including those that were predominantly white. This has been particularly important for the Conservative party, as their safest seats are usually less ethnically diverse.
In fact, the very poor result for the Conservatives, combined with their previous efforts to increase diversity by placing minority candidates in their safest seats, means that the Party emerges more diverse in percentage terms, than before the election. Although the raw numbers were down from 22 to 14 with one early resignation, five retirements, six losses and only four non-White MPs elected, the remaining MPs of non-White origins were defending majorities of over 20% and in the face of a poor electoral outcome overall, this is an increase in the proportion of their Parliamentary Party (from 6% to 11%).
The effect of a particularly large Labour victory on overall ethnic diversity in Westminster is still felt. Even after Labour lost their near monopoly in representing minority voters, they remained a leader, with the largest number of ethnic minority MPs in each Parliament since 1987. In this newly elected House of Commons, their Parliamentary Party now exceeds in number all of the ethnic minority MPs elected for any party at the last election, at 66.
A small blot on Labour’s record is that the new Cabinet is considerably less ethnically diverse than the historically most diverse Conservative Cabinet of 2019, with just three ethnic minority ministers. This has historically been the case with Labour: electing minority MPs, but rarely putting them in positions of power.
It is clear from the fact that it has been largely pre-determined that the 2024 election would see a rise in the ethnic diversity of Westminster, whatever the result of this election, that representation of non-White voters is a new normal for both Labour and the Conservative parties.
However, 2024 also saw a significant rise in numbers of Liberal Democrat MPs, and this party has been subject to much less scrutiny in terms of ethnic diversity. It has historically been a bit of a laggard in promoting under-represented groups in their formal candidate selection rules and arrangements. Currently, they are behind both main parties, with only an estimated 7% of their MPs being of minority ethnic heritage. While both Labour and Conservatives relied heavily on the central parties’ interventions, Liberal Democrats resisted any form of selection shortlists quotas until 2016. These kinds of quotas are the surest way of increasing representation, as we know from the huge progress Labour made on gender thanks to their All Women Shortlists, and in fact the Liberal Democrats themselves made on gender since 2016. Now that the party no longer can use the excuse of not having many winnable or indeed having very few safe seats, all eyes will be on their efforts to improve ethnic diversity of their Parliamentary Party. All eyes will now be on them to conform to the new normal, of fair representation of ethnic minority groups in Parliament.
