Hartlepool by-election: A shock rather than a surprise - but is it the start of a seismic shift?
ELECTION 2021
Hartlepool by-election: A shock but not a surprise - but is it the start of a seismic shift?
IT is a shock but not a surprise.
It is a shock because ruling parties do not make by-election gains: this is only the sixth in the last 100 years. It is a shock because Hartlepool has not elected a Conservative MP since 1959.
But it is not a surprise because in 2019, a Tory tsunami swept through the Tees Valley and County Durham. It lapped around Hartlepool, but the Brexit Party in this very Brexity town split the vote, allowing Labour to claim a 3,500 majority. This result, then, is just a continuation of 2019 – it shows that after Redcar, Sedgefield, Bishop Auckland and Durham North West, the blue tide is still coming in.