This is undoubtedly the best news that Boris Johnson has had during the election campaign so far. It doesn’t mean that the result of the election is now a foregone conclusion, and it does not mean that a hung parliament is now impossible, as Nigel Farage claimed, but the result of an election in which the Brexit party is not standing in Tory seats will probably not be the same as an election in which it was splitting the Brexit vote in those constituencies.
Only 11 days ago, when Farage announced that he would be standing candidates in around 600 seats in Britain, he was claiming that his tactic might harm Labour more than the Conservatives. At the time election expects said that he was wrong, and that Tory seats were most at risk. Today Farage has admitted that they were right, and he was wrong.
But how much difference will this make in practice? It it hard to say, but two points are worth stressing. First, Farage is making this announcement because his poll ratings have been falling. He is capitulating from a position of weakness, not a position of strength. The polls have not shifted a great deal in the past week, but one constant feature is that the Brexit party vote has been heading south. Perhaps he was not as big a threat to the Tories as people thought. Here are the figures from the Guardian’s poll tracker.
Second, the Brexit party still seems to be intent on standing candidates in Tory target seats – particularly the leave-leaning Labour seats in the north of England, where for a long time Farage has been saying his party could do well. In theory the Brexit party could still split the Brexit vote in these place, preventing Boris Johnson from making the gains he needs to win a majority. But it wouldn’t be in Farage’s interests to do this if he wants Johnson to have a majority, and so it seems more likely that, in reality, the Tories and the Brexit will operate unofficial non-aggression pacts in these places, allowing the best placed party to challenge Labour. That would be what you would expect from a “leave alliance” – which is what he now says exists. (See 12.19pm.)
Farage’s climbdown is considerable. Only 11 days ago he was saying that Johnson would have to abandon his Brexit plan wholesale for the Brexit party to give up its plan to stand 600 candidates in Britain. Since then Johnson has said nothing that amounts to any form of concession, and the points the PM has been making about wanting to break free of EU regulation are ones he has always been making. And, as Farage himself acknowledged, the promise not to extend the transition beyond the end of 2020 is effectively worthless in the light of what happened to Johnson’s “die in the ditch” pledge to deliver Brexit by 31 October. The only face-saving offer from the PM was the fact that he posted a video last night making these points, effectively offering Farage a ladder down which he could climb. (See 12.13pm.) There is already speculation that Farage came under pressure to concede from Johnson’s ally, Donald Trump. This is from the Labour MP David Lammy.
David Lammy
(@DavidLammy)Nigel Farage bottling it by standing down in Tory seats shows how vital it is for Remainers to cooperate.
We cannot allow this hard right alliance between Boris Johnson and Nigel Farage – dancing to the tune of Donald Trump – to permanently wreck our country. https://t.co/wMyMsPFaRq
Farage’s announcement may also prompt the BBC and other broadcasters to reconsider how they cover the Brexit party during the campaign. The BBC had invited him to a seven-party debate, and to a Question Time special. And all broadcasters have been covering the party on the assumption it is a GB-wide party, fighting all seats. In the light of today’s news, we may see less of Farage on TV than before. That could further suppress his vote.
One final point. Until relatively recently it was assumed that, if the Tories tried to fight an election without having delivered Brexit, they would get smashed by the Farage party. Almost all media commentators thought this, but so did Johnson himself, and probably Farage too. But that was another piece of conventional political wisdom (like the idea that Jeremy Corbyn could never win a Labour leadership contest) that turned out to be nonsense. You could cite this as proof that the Westminster commentariat are all rubbish (perhaps we are?), but it is probably better seen as evidence that voter behaviour is inherently unpredictable.
