Number cruncher: The papers tell the story

Forget class. The political battles of the 21st century will be fought over values, not social status. On election day this May, and in the days immediately afterwards, more than 90,000 people told YouGov how they voted. This large number allows us to examine the electorate in great detail.

Some Labour supporters say the party lost more working-class than middle-class support, and Ed Miliband must therefore “reconnect” with the party’s core vote. Right observation, wrong conclusion. Yes, the swing to the Conservatives among C2DE voters was slightly higher than among middle-class voters. But this is part of a long-term trend. Back in 1970, 56 per cent of working-class voters backed Labour, compared with 22 per cent of middle-class voters. This 34-point “class gap” now stands at just six points (27 per cent of middle-class voters backed Labour in May, compared with 33 per cent of working-class voters). Social class no longer matters as much.

What has replaced it? Age and gender play only a small role. Lib-Dem support is highest among the under-30s, Labour’s among parents in their 30s and 40s, and the Tories’ among the over-60s. And women are now slightly more Labour than men—reversing a gender gap that persisted throughout the 20th century.

But as the chart (below) shows, two other things matter more. The first is newspaper readership. Party loyalties are linked far more closely to the newspapers people read than anything else. The influence papers have on their readers is minimal: rather, most people choose the paper that best reflects their outlook. In other words, readership figures provide a map of Britain’s new voting tribes and their values.

The second, and more modest, influence is economic—not class in the traditional sense, but housing tenure and employer-type. Labour scores better than average, and the Tories worse, among council tenants and public sector workers. However, the people who, according to Marxist analysis, ought to be capitalism’s biggest victims, refuse to act according to type. In May, employees in the private sector preferred the Tories to Labour by 41 per cent to 26 per cent.

The lesson for Ed Miliband is clear. Forget any “core vote” strategy. It’s not Andy Capp you need to target but white van man (and woman) and their socially-conservative, banker-hating, financially nervous, racially tolerant, immigrant-wary sensibilities.