Peter Franklin is an Associate Editor of UnHerd.
When Alan Clark died in 1999, his vacant seat became the subject of immediate, if unseemly, speculation. The big question was whether Michael Portillo — the highest profile casualty of the 1997 Tory defeat — would stand in the looming by-election and thus make an early return to Parliament.
William Hague, who was the Conservative leader at the time, must have feared the worst. Not only was Portillo a “big beast” he’d also become the idol of the party’s modernisers. Elements of that faction were already conspiring against Hague — and with Portillo back in the Commons they’d have an alternative leader ready-to-go.
Hague’s allies might have been tempted to fix the selection process against his rival — choosing some unthreatening local councillor instead. And yet there was no hint of any such skullduggery. Portillo was duly selected as the Conservative candidate — and, on the 25 November 1999, elected as the new MP for Kensington and Chelsea with 56 per cent of the vote. Back then, I was a minor functionary in Conservative Central Office and witnessed all the stops being pulled out to aid his victory.
Nor was that the end of Hague’s magnanimity. Within a couple of months, he reshuffled the Shadow Cabinet to give Portillo the biggest possible promotion — to Shadow Chancellor and deputy leader of the party.
In short, faced with a potential challenge to his position, William Hague chose the path of honour and open-handedness. A quarter of a century later, the same cannot be said for Keir Starmer — whose place-persons on the Labour National Executive Committee have blocked Andy Burnham from standing in the Gorton and Denton by-election.
These days, by-elections are few and far between. As for a contest where Labour stands a chance of winning, those are rare as hen’s teeth. To compound the sheer flukiness of the situation, Gorton and Denton is in Greater Manchester, of which Burnham is the popular metropolitan mayor. So for Starmer to stand in his way doesn’t just offend against the British sense of fair play, but against fate itself.
Instead of doing the big thing, the Prime Minister has chosen the path of pettiness. If Labour loses in Gorton and Denton then then the blame will attach fairly-and-squarely to him and his right hand man, Morgan McSweeney.
But just how likely is a Labour defeat — and, by objective psephological standards, just how big a deal would it be?
Let’s start by getting one thing straight: Gorton and Denton is not part of the “Red Wall”.
Yes, it’s north of the Watford Gap and not an inner city constituency, but the Red Wall concept (as originally defined by James Kanagasooriam) applies specifically to marginal seats where the Conservatives have regularly failed to turn promising voter demographics into election victories. In 2019, Boris Johnson temporarily cracked the code — winning about fifty Red Wall seats from Labour. But then he and his successors betrayed that mandate, allowing Labour to recapture its lost territory. Labour is now set to lose these seats again — but this time to Reform UK. Indeed, on current poll ratings, Reform would be expected to win a Red Wall by-election easily.
But Gorton and Denton should be rock solid Labour.
Had it been fought on its current boundaries in 2019 — the year of Johnson’s Red Wall breakthrough — the Labour candidate would have cruised to victory with 67 per cent of the vote. In 2024, the party’s victory was less overwhelming — secured on slightly more than half the vote. However, the non-Labour vote was fragmented. The Conservatives fell back and three new challengers, Reform, the Greens and George Galloway’s Workers Party of Britain, made progress. A majority of 13,413 ought to be impregnable. If the Red Wall represents Labour’s outermost defences, then Gorton and Denton is more like the inner keep. For the enemy to even be at the gate is seriously bad news.
And yet that appears to be the case. Nowcast currently predicts a narrow Labour win over Reform. Electoral Calculus is predicting a wafer-thin victory for the Greens. Modelling for the New Statesman gives it to Reform — with 34% of the vote to 29% for Labour and 16% for the Greens. (Embarrassingly for Starmer, the same analysis shows Labour winning if Andy Burnham were the candidate, which, of course, he won’t be.)
So, Starmer hasn’t just damaged his reputation by blocking Burnham, he’s staked what’s left of it on a fundamentally unpredictable three-horse race.
It’s worth taking a closer look at the constituency. It’s western half (Gorton, together with Levenshulme and Burnage) sits on the outskirts of central Manchester. It is urban and multi-cultural in character, with a high proportion of Muslim residents (between 18 and 60%, depending on the ward). The Denton half of the constituency is further away from the city and predominantly white working class. It doesn’t take a political scientist to work out where the respective cores of the Labour and Reform vote are going to come from. So will this come down to which of the two parties runs the most effective get-out-the-vote campaign?
Only in part, because Labour isn’t just fighting against Reform, but also to retain its status as the main opposition to Reform — which isn’t quite the same thing. The nightmare scenario for Starmer is a repeat of what happened in the Caerphilly by-election, where the anti-Reform vote collapsed to Plaid Cymru.
In Gorton and Denton, the Green Party is in the best position to pull off a similar move on Labour. Though he was born in Manchester, Zack Polanski has said that he won’t be putting himself forward as his party’s candidate. One of his deputies, Mothin Ali, has expressed an interest, but if they want to exploit local outrage over Andy Burnham’s exclusion, the Greens would be well-advised to stick with a local candidate.
Also, keep an eye on the Worker’s Party. George Galloway had said he’d personally run against Burnham — which means we’ve been doubly-denied by Starmer’s interference. Nevertheless, the battle between the Left-of-centre parties for the Muslim vote will be intense and, ironically, could be what delivers victory to Reform.
But what of the Conservative campaign? Well, as indicated, this is stony ground for us. If we’re nowhere near to recovering the Red Wall, then Gorton and Denton offers no hope at all. So, from our point of view, what would be the best of all realistic outcomes?
The answer a Green victory. Yes, I’m being serious. Just consider the alternatives. If Labour wins, then Starmer’s dishonourable cowardice will be vindicated — and wouldn’t that be sick-making? Depending on the timings, an unexpected victory in such a high-profile contest might also offset the impact of Labour losses in the Scottish, Welsh and local elections. Yes, if Starmer falls he’ll only be replaced by another Labour Prime Minister, but it could it mean that his very worst policies — like the Chagos surrender and the assisted suicide bill — are abandoned.
The big disadvantage of a Reform win is that it would help Nigel Farage regain the momentum he lost to Kemi Badenoch in the latter part of 2025. On the upside, there’d still be panic in the Labour ranks — but arguably not to the same extent as a Green victory. At heart, Labour is a party of ideology not power. While it doesn’t want to lose its grip on the country, to lose its leadership of the Left would provoke an existential meltdown.
Finally, the prospect of the Greens gaining real power might just concentrate minds on the Right.
Who knows, the leading lights of the Conservative and Reform parties might even aspire to something more edifying than their ongoing grudge match.