England’s new Mayors: who will win? (Part 2: West Midlands)

See Part 1 here.

Recently, the Labour Party announced the selection of its candidate for the Mayoralty in the West of England (Lesley Mansell) and Tees Valley (Sue Jeffrey). This follows on from the selection of Steve Rotherham (Liverpool), Siôn Simon (the West Midlands) and Andy Burnham (Greater Manchester). Elections are also due in Cambridgeshire & Peterborough. These new Mayors will have authority over economic development and regeneration, transport, borrowing, skills, housing, waste management and other affairs.

Speculation has arisen about possible surprising outcomes: the chances of Liberal Democrat candidate Jane Brophy have been talked up in Greater Manchester, with the Lib Dem pledging to campaign on a pro-EU platform, while the Guardian described the West Midlands race as “close” between Labour and the Tories. With no polls of these contests likely to be conducted, what we can tell from recent local contests and national polls about who is likely to win? Continuing today with the West Midlands, and finishing with Liverpool, I'm taking a look at the contests, sorted by (my
own) order of closeness.

West Midlands (Lean Labour)

2015 General Election Result:

2016 Local Election Results:

2016 PCC Election Results:

The name might confuse you, but the new Mayor of the West Midlands won’t represent the entire English region of 5.6 million people. Instead, they’ll be elected by the metropolitan county of the West Midlands, made up of Wolverhampton, Dudley, Walsall, Sandwell, Birmingham, Solihull and Coventry. This is still a pretty large area, comprised of 2.8 million people.

Somewhat like the West of England, on the surface it appears safe for one party – in this case, Labour. The party holds 21 of the 28 Parliamentary seats in the region (the Tories hold the remaining 7), and they lead the administration in 10 of the 11 local authorities. But on a very bad night, Labour’s hold on the West Midlands could be at risk.

In 2015, Labour won 43% of the vote across the county, with the Tories winning 33%. That worked out to about a 111,000-vote edge for Labour, which is a solid lead that was more-or-less replicated (a margin of 109,000) in the 2016 local elections, where Labour won 47% of the county-wide vote to the Tories’ 28%.

But with the Tories scoring big polling leads, the West Midlands region is exactly the kind of area where a big drop in Labour support could cost it the Mayoralty. If YouGov’s recent poll showing the Tories on 42% and Labour on 25% nationally turns out to be accurate, and the subsequent swing against Labour occurs in the West Midlands, Labour’s general election lead of 111,000 (9%) votes would get converted into a Conservative lead of 11,000 (1%). The Labour-Conservative seat balance would change from 21-7 to 15-13.

Not only that, but the West Midlands voted to Leave the EU by 59% to 41%, leaving UKIP – who got 15% at the general election in the county – an opening if Theresa May still hasn’t initiated Article 50 by the time of the Mayoral election.

Nonetheless, having said all this, Labour still dominated in the election for Police and Crime Commissioner, winning 50% of the votes in the first round.

Although the area might be vulnerable if Labour really is dropping dramatically in support, most electoral evidence so far suggests that a Corbyn-led Labour Party is keeping Labour support static at around 30% of the vote (losing just 18 councillors in the 2016 locals, for example) so if the party has another night like May 2016, the West Midlands should go Labour very comfortably. Thus my prediction is for a Labour win.