Abstract
A total of 3304 candidates stood in the 2017 general election, down from 3971 in 2015 and far fewer than the 4150—the highest number ever recorded—who stood in 2010. An average of 5.1 candidates stood per constituency in 2017; they represented 71 parties along with 187 independent candidates and the Speaker. Nearly half of these candidates (1568) lost their £500 deposit, failing to meet the 5% minimum vote share threshold, and the Treasury’s lost deposit fund was £784,000 better off after the election.
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Notes
- 1.
‘Briefing Paper. General Election 2017: Results and Analysis’, House of Commons Library, 3 April 2018, http://researchbriefings.parliament.uk/ResearchBriefing/Summary/CBP-7979.
- 2.
Noel Dempsey, ‘Lost Deposits’, House of Commons Library, 22 June 2017, https://secondreading.uk/elections/lost-deposits.
- 3.
‘Local Alliances’, Progressive Alliance, http://www.progressivealliance.org.uk/alliances.
- 4.
Three MPs departed from Parliament in 2017 before the election was announced. Tristram Hunt, the historian and Labour MP for Stoke-on-Trent Central, exited the Commons in January 2017 to become director of the Victoria and Albert Museum; Jamie Reed, the MP for Copeland since 2005, said that his departure had ‘absolutely nothing to do with Jeremy Corbyn’, although he had been an outspoken critic of the Labour leader. Another by-election was due to be held on 4 May 2017 in Manchester Gorton following the death of Labour MP Gerald Kaufman, but it was cancelled when the general election was announced (the first by-election to be cancelled since 1924).
- 5.
‘General Election 2017: Results and Analysis’, http://researchbriefings.parliament.uk/ResearchBriefing/Summary/CBP-7979.
- 6.
David Butler and Dennis Kavanagh, The British General Election of October 1974. Macmillan, 1975, p. 208.
- 7.
Jack Lopresti, MP for Filton & Bradley Stoke, faced the possibility of deselection as supporters of his ex-wife allegedly sought to have him deselected, but he hung on. See ‘Lopresti Calls Cops on Tories Trying to Deselect Him’, Guido Fawkes, 28 April 2017, https://order-order.com/2017/04/28/lopresti-calls-cops-on-tories-trying-to-deselect-him.
- 8.
Emma Bean, ‘Corbynsceptic MPs Alan Johnson and Tom Blenkinsop to Stand Down at Election’, LabourList, 18 April 2017, https://labourlist.org/2017/04/tom-blenkinsop-will-not-stand-for-re-election-in-snap-general.
- 9.
Butler and Kavanagh, The British General Election of October 1974, p. 210.
- 10.
Mark Wallace, ‘Our CCHQ Election Audit: The Rusty Machine, Part Two. How and Why the Ground Campaign Failed’, ConservativeHome, 6 September 2017, https://www.conservativehome.com/majority_conservatism/2017/09/our-cchq-election-audit-the-rusty-machine-part-two-how-and-why-the-ground-campaign-failed.html.
- 11.
Part IV, clause 17 of the Conservative Party Constitution reads: ‘The Board shall have power to do anything which in its opinion relates to the management and administration of the Party …’
- 12.
Alan Haselhurst, the MP for Saffron Walden, who was nearly 80 years old and had been an MP for almost 40 years, was facing pressure to retire; he cited the decision to reselect sitting MPs as part of his motivation for standing down. See Angela Singer, ‘Sir Alan Haselhurst Steps Down after 40 Years as Saffron Walden MP’, Dunmow Broadcast, 25 April 2017, www.dunmowbroadcast.co.uk/news/sir-alan-haselhurst-steps-down-after-40-years-as-saffron-walden-mp-1-4989811.
- 13.
Mark Wallace, ‘Exclusive: CCHQ Will Shortlist Candidates for Target Seats without Even Inviting Applications’, ConservativeHome, 20 April 2017, https://www.conservativehome.com/parliament/2017/04/exclusive-cchq-will-shortlist-candidates-for-target-seats-without-even-inviting-applications.html.
- 14.
Mark Wallace, ‘Centralisation and Chaos—Inside the Rush to Select Conservative Candidates in Time for the Election’, ConservativeHome, 9 May 2017, www.conservativehome.com/thetorydiary/2017/05/centralisation-and-chaos-inside-the-rush-to-select-conservative-candidates-in-time-for-the-election.html.
- 15.
Ibid.
- 16.
Danczuk stood as an independent and received 1.8% of the vote in Rochdale.
- 17.
They were Corbyn’s political secretary Katy Clark; Sam Tarry, who played an important role in Corbyn’s second leadership campaign; and David Prescott, son of Lord Prescott and former Corbyn speechwriter, both of whom failed to be selected in Alan Johnson’s former seat of Hull West & Hessle.
- 18.
Steve Rotheram, ‘I Have Tried My Utmost for a Local Candidate in Liverpool Walton’, LabourList, 7 May 2017, https://labourlist.org/2017/05/steve-rotheram-i-have-tried-my-utmost-for-a-local-candidate-in-liverpool-walton.
- 19.
For example, shortly after the election, it was revealed that Jared O’Mara, who had won Sheffield Hallam, had made a series of sexist and homophobic comments online, in addition to a series of other allegations about his behaviour, which led to his suspension from the party.
- 20.
Tim Ross and Tom McTague. Betting the House: The Inside Story of the 2017 Election, Biteback, 2017.
- 21.
‘UKIP’s Clacton Candidate Dropped in “Shambolic” Move’, BBC News, 10 May 2017, www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-essex-39870009.
- 22.
‘General Election 2017: Results and Analysis’, http://researchbriefings.parliament.uk/ResearchBriefing/Summary/CBP-7979, p. 46.
- 23.
We are extremely grateful to Linda Hein, Agnes Magyar, Naveen Saini and Nikki Soo for their outstanding help with 2017 data collection for this chapter.
- 24.
See Agnes Magyar and Jennifer Hudson, ‘More Female Candidates Selected, But the Gender Balance of the House of Commons is Likely to Be Little Changed after June 8’, Constitution Unit, 24 May 2017, https://constitution-unit.com/2017/05/24/more-female-candidates-have-been-selected-but-the-gender-balance-of-the-house-of-commons-is-likely-to-be-little-changed-after-june-8/#more-5832.
- 25.
- 26.
We collect data on parliamentary candidates from public/available sources. We do not survey or contact candidates for sociodemographic data, hence there is missing data, which varies by party.
- 27.
Hamed Chapman, ‘Record Number of Muslim MPs Selected’, Muslim News, 23 June 2017, http://muslimnews.co.uk/newspaper/home-news/record-number-muslim-mps-elected.
- 28.
The Muslim Council of Britain’s Research & Documentation Committee, British Muslims in Numbers. A Demographic, Socio-Economic and Health Profile of Muslims in Britain Drawing on the 2011 Census, 2015, https://www.mcb.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2015/02/MCBCensusReport_2015.pdf.
- 29.
In 2015, the average age of newly elected MPs was 43.9, continuing the trend of newly elected MPs to be older, rather than younger, on average. See Chrysa Lamprinakou, Marco Morucci, Rosie Campbell and Jennifer van Heerde-Hudson, ‘All Change in the House? The Profile of Candidates and MPs in the 2015 British General Election’, Parliamentary Affairs, 70 (2016): 207–32.
- 30.
Three more teenage Greens were 19-year-olds: Benjamin Smith, who stood in Cardiff Central, Alice Kiff in Birmingham Edgbaston and Lawrence McNally in Cities of London & Westminster. Two Labour candidates were 19 years old: Eli Aldridge in Westmorland & Lonsdale and Christopher Rimicans in North Ayrshire & Arran. Rory Daniels, aged 19, stood for the Liberal Democrats in Llanelli. One UKIP candidate was 19 years old, Nathan Ryding standing in Wigan. Finally, Jack Render, also aged 19, stood for the Yorkshire Party in Skipton & Ripon.
- 31.
Sarah Priddy, ‘Briefing Paper. MPs Related to Other Current or Former Members in the 2017 Parliament’, House of Commons Library, 26 September 2017, https://researchbriefings.parliament.uk/ResearchBriefing/Summary/SN04809#fullreport.
- 32.
Andrea Jenkyns and Jack Lopresti married in December 2017, bringing the total to five.
- 33.
Rebecca Montacute and Tim Carr, ‘Research Brief. Parliamentary Privilege—The MPs in 2017’, Sutton Trust, 18 June 2017, https://www.suttontrust.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/06/Parliamentary-privilege-2017_FINAL_V2.pdf.
- 34.
For reasons explained above (Note 26), there is missing data, which varies by party.
- 35.
See Lamprinakou et al., ‘All Change in the House?’
- 36.
Ibid.
- 37.
Andrew Reynolds, ‘UK Set to Break Record for Highest Number of LGBTQ MPs after General Election’, Pink News, 5 June 2017, www.pinknews.co.uk/2017/06/05/uk-set-to-break-record-for-highest-number-of-lgbtq-mps-after-general-election.
- 38.
Eric Pickles, ‘Eric Pickles’ General Election Review 2017’, Conservatives, September 2017, https://www.conservatives.com/gereview. The Pickles review suggests selecting candidates early for the next election to avoid the short-cutting of the selection process that removed local associations from the shortlisting process.
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Campbell, R., Hudson, J. (2018). Political Recruitment Under Pressure: MPs and Candidates. In: The British General Election of 2017. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-95936-8_15
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-95936-8_15
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