A Week in Westminster: Unpacking the 2024 Manifestos

As the dust settles on manifesto week, we take a look at what has shaped the agenda and how future Prime Minister hopefuls will have been left feeling as the clock ticks down to polling day.

In 2019, few people would have predicted how the 2024 General Election campaign seems to be working out, with Boris Johnson’s sizeable majority now but a distant memory and Farage’s Reform seemingly on course to beat the Conservatives in terms of vote share. In the battle of Starmer versus Sunak, it’s clear who the frontrunner is as the curtain falls on the third week of campaigning.

In the red corner, with endorsements from Sir Patrick Vallance and various business leaders in his back pocket, Starmer projected a confident offer rooted in fiscal security, investment and reform. This was an important moment for the Party to get right and even neutral parties have been quick to praise Sir Keir for his professionalism and calm manner, even in the face of some internal protest. In the blue corner, despite using Silverstone – a hotbed of fast-cars and action – as the launch pad for his manifesto, Sunak’s bid to claw back support ahead of the election did not have the impact he hoped it would.

But, what does it all mean in practice?

The cornerstone of Starmer’s pitch to voters is economic growth. In contrast to Sunak’s pledge of a 2p reduction in national insurance, Starmer committed to no rises in income tax, NICs or VAT under a Labour Government and has pinned his hopes of economic revival on ‘wealth creation’. The fallout from that has been widespread concerns that there will be very little room for fiscal manoeuvre upon entering No10. Starmer and Reeves will face difficult decisions, with mammoth expectations on their shoulders to deliver.

This manifesto was far from a bolt from the blue, more a well-trailed document that sketched out some of the Party’s plan for power, though it remained light on detail. Over in Whitehall, civil servants will be combing through the document and are already working behind the scenes on draft pieces of legislation that could be presented under a Starmer-led Government.

Meanwhile, the Tories’ set of uninspiring pledges failed to offer anything new to the electorate and it was not the watershed moment Sunak had been hoping for. Instead, the manifesto crystalised what we already knew: the Party has exhausted its reserve of ideas. The were tax cuts featured throughout – including a pledge to increase the personal allowance for pensioners and to cut their income tax through a new Triple Lock Plus – but, as economists continue to pull apart their proposals, all eyes will now be fixed on the Tory right, who could be set to launch their own manifesto next week.

Watching closely will be Sir Ed Davey’s team who have good reason to be quietly confident of their chances of stealing a portion of the traditional Tory vote, particularly in the south of the country. They will also be keeping a close eye on Starmer’s chances in Scotland, with a view to entering into coalition negotiations should the election result be closer than many are expecting.

For the Conservatives, they enter the weekend with a sense of unease that when they awake on 5th July, there is a real possibility that they could be the third largest party in the UK. Meanwhile, the mood music on the ground in Labour HQ will be overwhelmingly positive, and rightly so. The only question that now remains is just how substantial Labour’s majority will be.