Unless Labour radically changes on Brexit, it may never win back the voters it has lost

SALFORD, ENGLAND - MAY 16: Labour Party leader Jeremy Corbyn views houses with solar panels on Mereside Grove in Worsley on May 16, 2019 in Salford, England. Labour Party leader Jeremy Corbyn and Rebecca Long Bailey are visiting the area to highlight the party’s plans to address the climate crisis and fuel poverty. (Photo by Anthony Devlin/Getty Images)

When your support hits 14 per cent of the electorate, on the biggest issue Britain has faced this century, something’s wrong. What Labour needs to answer urgently is: what happened, could it have been avoided and what do we do now?

The Lord Ashcroft polling, summarised in this graphic, shows the answer to question one. At the start of the European parliament elections, Labour had already lost six percentage points from its June 2017 high, and stood at 34 per cent. Its vote then collapsed by a further 20 points. Three quarters of the votes lost went to clear Remain-supporting parties, like the Lib Dems, the Greens, the SNP and Plaid Cymru. Only one in four of Labour’s lost votes went to the Brexit Party.