I think I spoke about this in the aftermath of the election, but demographics are a big unspoken factor in why my area (County Durham) has gone from Labour stronghold to electoral battleground over the last 2 decades. The area has been haemorrhaging young people for decades, probably half the people I went to school with in Durham have moved away since. On top of that, the last decade or so has seen an explosion of Newcastle commuter belt housing and retirement communities in and around post-industrial areas.
I'm not sure how the party can get round this under FPTP. People on both wings of the party can talk all they want about how to 'win back the heartlands' and blame each other (with some merit on both sides) for losing traditional Labour voters, but the fact is that the heartlands they're talking about don't really exist anymore.
Thanks for that, I’ve read about the shifting demographic but it’s nice to hear a first-hand account of it.
Yeah I agree Labour is really in a tough place right now. The narrative that Corbyn is solely to blame for 2019 is dangerous because it’s simply untrue and Starmer, simply by shifting closer to the centre ground and been a more palatable mainstream figure, is not going to gain the votes that people seem to think he will.