Byelection in tight marginal...

[UndercoverElephant]

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-c ... e-48123355

This seat was historically tory, occasionally flipping to labour, but tories had for the last three elections before Labour took it by 607 votes in 2017. Constituency voted to leave by 71/39.

Farage has just tweeted that the BP will be fielding a candidate, so it looks like a Labour hold, although there's an outside chance of the Brexit Party pulling off what would be a sensational victory.

George Galloway is standing: https://www.peterboroughtoday.co.uk/new ... -1-8912072

Vote will be on June 6th.

A lot of comment at the moment is that Labour will hold this easily. I am not so sure. It's currently held by Labour with a majority of 600. Tories won it for the previous three elections, but it has never been safe. The constituency voted to leave the EU 61/39.

The assumption is being made that the Brexit Party will split the tory vote and hand the seat to Labour. But the very fact that everybody knows that half the tory vote will defect to the BP means the seat is no longer a lab-tory marginal, and that means that potential labour voters who support brexit but don't want to risk letting a tory win will feel they can also defect to the BP without running that risk. Also, labour supporters who want to punish labour for not being supportive enough of a referendum might well decide to protest vote for the LibDems or ChuK, which will make it easier for BP to beat Labour.

If this plays out, we might even be left with a three-way marginal with the tories pushed into third place.