Mancman Backs Burnham — who knew?

Labour outperformed the polls in Greater Manchester this week, comfortably holding its mayoralty against a Reform and Green challenge. While their vote share is markedly down on what Andy Burnham got for Labour in 2024, compared to the prediction markets and even the more bullish pollsters, Labour didn’t do half bad.

In fact, Labour outperformed the polls by between six to nine percentage points. The Greens underperformed by two to four. The Reform performance is mixed — as expected according to some, off by a few according to others. The Tories, meanwhile, underperformed, falling behind Restore — words I did not expect to type up outside Great Yarmouth. If you’re after a non-Labour narrative in these coming weeks, the not insubstantial share for Restore is something worth pursuing.

I have a few observations about the result for you to consider. But first, the borough breakdowns.

Turnout fell furthest in Reform-friendly boroughs. It held more firm where the Reform vote has historically been weak. One of the biggest shifts on the May local elections was in Wigan, where the Labour vote jumped by 22pts, the Reform vote fell by 16pts, and turnout fell by 41 per cent. (Please note the distinction between per cent and percentage point here!)

In Oldham, turnout fell by half, and the Labour share more than doubled. Whereas in boroughs where turnout didn’t fall by much, such as Bury, Labour’s vote soared by 20pts, but the Reform share fell only by 7pts.

Those Reform drops in Tameside, in Stockport, Rochdale and Bury can almost entirely be attributed to the presence of Restore on the ballot paper. Add the radical right vote together and the shifts on May are next to non-existent. But that only tells half the story. In Wigan, the combined radical right vote is down 6pts. And in Salford, it’s down 8pts.

What’s most interesting is that in Salford, turnout fell by only 16 per cent — the smallest of any borough.

The Greens can comfort themselves in knowing they came a solid second in Manchester-proper. But everywhere else they polled 8-13 per cent of the vote — a reminder to all perhaps that Manchester isn’t Greater Manchester. And that the ask for the Greens in gaining this mayoralty was more tall than anyone I think appreciated.

In Oldham, something that’s intrigued me is that in the May local elections a sizeable portion of the borough opted for pro-Gaza independent candidates — not 23 per cent (for some of the indies that fought in Oldham weren’t quite so left-wing) but close to. That the Greens didn’t fall in Oldham, but nor did they even rise, while being the only left-wing option on the ballot paper, should be written up as a disappointing development for them.

Perhaps their would-be voters didn’t turn out — Oldham’s turnout fall was the worst of all across Greater Manchester.

Labour’s Bev Craig put on 58,076 votes in the second round.

That number is 73 per cent of the equivalent Green and Lib Dem total. In other words, Labour was probably able to count on six to seven in ten of the progressive vote moving its way in a second round.

Reform’s Sian Astley, meanwhile, put on only 45,250 votes. And among right-wing parties (the Conservatives and Restore) that equated to 52 per cent of the right-wing total. That this 45k figure is one k short of the 46 first preferences for Restore neatly tells this story. Reform’s ceiling is lower than progressive parties (even Labour, for now) when it comes to tactical voting. And Restore voters, surprisingly or not, are not wholly willing to come to the aid of their right-wing bedfellows.

That’s a story in itself. But let’s not get carried away. Voters don’t always take up the option for second preferences — in London’s 2021 mayoral election 58 per cent of votes for smaller parties did not end up with the top-two performers, the Tories and Labour.

Whatever the case of toxic Reform, the Restore factor is a real one. And it’s not confined to the flatlands of East Anglia. Nationally Restore are meant to be taking one-in-ten Reform voters. But in Tameside it looks like they took the equivalent of three-in-ten. When you reallocate Restore to Reform, Reform win one or two boroughs. Instead, what we just had is, again, a clean-sweep for Labour.

In the shock of the century, Mancman moved to Burnham’s Labour in a big way. Not much more to say there. It’s a sample of public feeling in the premier’s own stomping ground. The national polls will tell the rest.