Labour’s win in the Chester by-election is not the walkover that people think it is

A good by-election win, but not one that suggests Keir Starmer is heading for a majority at the next general election, writes John Rentoul

No one is expecting Starmer to win by a landslide (PA)

Labour did well in the Chester by-election yesterday, and congratulations to Samantha Dixon, the new MP. But the brutal fact is that a swing to Labour of 14 per cent falls short of where the party needs to be if Keir Starmer is to win a majority in the Commons.

This may seem surprising, given that Labour is so far ahead in the national opinion polls and Westminster is abuzz with news of Conservative MPs who are making alternative plans because they think the next general election is a write-off.

Those of us who learned our trade at the feet of Sir David Butler, the sultan of swing, as Michael Crick calls him in his biography, know that the swing is the thing. It is not the only thing – politics is about much more than numbers and is essentially unpredictable, thank goodness – but in politics you not only have to be able to count, you have to understand the concept of swing.