These two middle England by-elections don’t change the story, or even bend it much; but they strongly confirm it. Mid Bedfordshire and Tamworth are not seats you would expect Labour to win unless it was on an almost unstoppable course towards national power. Tick. They are mid-1990s Blair-sized victories. Tick.
Overturning majorities of more than 24,000 in Mid Beds and more than 19,000 in Tamworth is a huge achievement of discipline and organisation, one that senior members of Keir Starmer’s team thought unattainable only a few weeks ago. Bookies were equally uncertain. The Westminster gossip last week had been of the Tories narrowly retaining both. So let’s not be too world-weary.
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