Alex Morton is Head of Political Economy at Onward.
While the result in Makerfield was the most important by-election result in decades and has resulted in a change of Prime Minister, the result in Aberdeen South was also key in signalling why and how politics is changing. The Conservatives nearly doubled their vote to over 49 per cent from 2024 and took the seat from the SNP.
This victory was not pre-ordained, nor was it just an anti-SNP swing. The SNP held on in the Arbroath and Broughty Ferry by-election, where the main challenger was Labour, who collapsed to fourth place in that seat, behind both the Conservatives and Reform.
The win in Aberdeen South was a result of policy change since the 2024 General Election. It was a result of Kemi Badenoch’s rejection of Net Zero 2050, a policy endorsed by both the SNP and Labour, as well as Ed Miliband’s disastrous ban on new drilling in the North Sea, which is having serious impacts on the economy, particularly in areas like Aberdeen.
The Conservatives ran an effective and disciplined campaign, ignoring the media hubbub around Makerfield, (e.g. allowing Claire Coutinho, crucial in developing the detail of this area, to demolish David Lammy at last Wednesday’s PMQs for backing Ed Miliband’s agenda). They hammered the SNP and Labour for the damage their policies are doing.
This victory was thus only possible due to the shift in policy that Kemi began in March 2025, when she declared that Net Zero 2050 was unrealistic and had to be ditched. Had Kemi continued with the failing 2010-2024 consensus on energy policy, one she had opposed from the outset, (with her magnificent putdown in 2019 when Theresa May rushed this disastrous agenda through that, “Many of my constituents, especially schoolchildren, will be delighted by this announcement, but others are rightly sceptical about the costs”), victory in Aberdeen South would have been impossible.
This was a win due to Kemi changing Conservative policy. Far from the lazy criticism that Kemi lacks policy detail, as the 44 page Alternative King’s Speech set out last month, the Conservatives are moving on from the 2010-2024 government and backing a genuine right-wing agenda, not via gimmicks and press releases, but serious and difficult thinking.
While Kemi has done it holding the Conservatives together, Kemi has rightly said those who want to stand as Tory MPs at the next General Election must sign up to a contract of firm commitments, (e.g. to leave the ECHR), so if you vote Conservative, you know what you are getting. This will be key at the next election as Reform have some attractive policies, but they are mixed with confusion on areas like nationalisation and economics or welfare, (e.g. constant flip-flopping on ending the two-child benefit cap). Meanwhile for Labour, swapping leaders and policies mid-parliament is a reminder what you vote for now may not be there in future. But now, not only will the Tory policies have changed, if you vote Tory, these are the policies that will be delivered.
I first met Kemi twenty years ago, when she worked on one of Cameron’s policy groupings, and it was clear then she was a principled and formidable individual. I urged her to stand in the 2022 Tory leadership contest and was her head of policy then and in the 2024 contest jointly with the incredibly skilled Victoria Hewson, (without whom the Alternative Kings Speech document could not exist).
I supported and worked for Kemi as she grasped what is now becoming commonplace on the right – that the Blairite settlement was broken, and that Britain had to change both to get its economy moving and to ward of the threat of extremism from the left and right. Indeed, now even Blair himself seems to be repudiating his legacy, including on disastrous and expensive radical decarbonisation.
Kemi was and is, someone who has both a deep institutional love for the Conservative party, but also a real understanding it must change to win again or even deserve victory. At Onward, where I am now working, we are aiming to help this transformation continue and deepen. On energy, we have an excellent paper on Small Modular Reactors coming out in the next month, and have just taken on the incredibly well-respected Ed Hezlet, one of the best minds on energy policy, to help develop a different approach to energy policy – one that prioritises security of supply and affordability for households and businesses alike. This is all part of what must be an ongoing renewal.
The Conservatives cannot look at the Aberdeen South result and be complacent. It really is change or bust. The victory is a sign that if the Conservatives have the intellectual strength to move on from the failures of 2010-2024, they can survive and even thrive. The renewal we are seeing in energy policy and other policy areas needs to both deepen and spread if the Conservatives are to truly going to change to win.