{"id":694,"date":"2024-03-11T14:38:39","date_gmt":"2024-03-11T14:38:39","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.qub.ac.uk\/pb-happ\/?p=694"},"modified":"2024-03-11T14:38:39","modified_gmt":"2024-03-11T14:38:39","slug":"the-striking-absence-of-the-working-class-in-uk-politics","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.qub.ac.uk\/pb-happ\/2024\/03\/11\/the-striking-absence-of-the-working-class-in-uk-politics\/","title":{"rendered":"The Striking Absence of the Working Class in UK Politics"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

The House of Parliament was coined with the term, ‘male, pale and stale’ following the May 2015 election – it was stated that the UK was one of the worst countries in Western Europe for female representation and only 6% of MP’s being from ethnic minorities. It is plausible to argue that British political institutions, and not just the House of Commons, remains unrepresentative of the British population in a descriptive sense. (Cowley, 2016).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Contemporary discussions surrounding representation in parliament have highlighted a shift in attitudes. Previously, it mattered less who MP’s were, as long as they were, ‘the person for the job,’ whereas since the early 2010’s there has been a demand for ‘a politics where politicians look like their constituent they represent. {As} that’s not what Westminster looks like today.’ As Ed Miliband repeatedly argued. (Cowley, 2016. P.123)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

And arguably, the Government and House of Parliament has worked to successfully integrate a better representation of women and ethnic minorities. With 2019 creating a first in history for any party to have over 40% of female candidates. (Watson, 2020)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Source: (Watson, 2020)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Minority<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Source: British Future<\/a> (2019), House of Commons Library Briefing Paper CBP7529, UK Election Statistics: 1918-2019<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Yet, in none of these discussions or campaigns to help improve diversity and inclusivity in the Houses of Parliament has there been mention of the unrepresented working class. As Allen and Cairney note (2015) politicians are somehow a class apart, they have never had ‘real jobs’ and therefore do not understand ‘normal’ people’s concerns and are distant and cut off from their voters. The working class are being left behind while ‘career politicians’ flood Westminster. Findings and reports published in Sutton Trust’s ‘Elitist Britain’ 2019 indicate how under represented the majority of the UK is, and how the privately educated and funded MP’s have dominated both parliament and government. (The Sutton Trust, 2019)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

House of Parliament:<\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Firstly, we will analyse the absence of working class MP’s sitting in parliament. 29% of MP’s attended a Private school, despite this being down 4% since the last publication of ‘Elitist Britain, 2014’, it is still more than five times as much that of the population, which currently sits at 7% attending private schools. It is also important to note that the proportion of MP’s who attended private schools differ substantially by political party. In the Conservative party, just under half (45%) attended an independent school, compared to 15% in the Labour Party. However, the real misrepresentation in UK parliament rests with how many MP’s attended Oxbridge (Oxford or Cambridge University) compared to the electorate. 24% of MP’s in 2019 had attended Oxbridge, which had not changed since 2014, yet less than 1% of the UK population will study here. (Riegals, n.d.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Source: (The Sutton Trust, 2019)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Government:<\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n

While the absence of the working class is still high within MP’s, it is declining. Yet, the opposite effect is happening for those who form the government. Lizz Truss and Boris Johnson’s first cabinets had the highest proportions of private-educated ministers since the early 1990’s. (Ward, 2022). In 2019, 39% of the cabinet attended a private school and 57% attended Oxbridge, which is only 3% down from 2014. Again, these figures show the stark dominance of privately educated individuals in UK Politics.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Source: (The Sutton Trust, 2019)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Reasons why:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Rainbow Murray (2014) argued that we should view these statistics as fact of how OVER-represented the wealthier section of society is, and not focus on how UNDER-represented other groups are. We often see reasoning behind the lack of working class, or women or ethnic minorities in politics as being ‘a lack of supply.’ Therefore focusing on resources and solution to help engage these ‘minorities’ in politics. However, perhaps the aim should be dismantle the over-representation of MP’s and Cabinet Ministers who do not fully represent the people they claim to stand on their behalf.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

To conclude, since the 2010’s the demand for ‘politics where politicians look like their constituents they represent,’ has been growing. Yet as these figure, shown above, suggest that despite the demand, the reality is very different. It is correct that areas have improved, such as slightly less MP’s are privately educated or Oxbridge students, yet it is unacceptable to justify a ‘representative’ government when said government is still so massively out of proportion to the electorate. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Reference list<\/h1>\n\n\n\n

Allen, P. and Cairney, P. (2015). What do we mean when we talk about the \u2018political class\u2019?. Political Studies Review<\/em>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

British Future. (2019). \u2018Diversity milestone\u2019 as one in ten MPs now from an ethnic minority background. – British Future<\/em>. [online] Available at: https:\/\/www.britishfuture.org\/britain-elects-diverse-parliament-ever\/.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Cowley, P. (2016). Political Recruitment and the Political Class. In: Developments in British Politics<\/em>. London: Macmillan Publishers Limited, pp.1\u2013337.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Murray, R. (2014). Quotas for men: Reframing gender quotas as a means of improving representation for all. American Political Science Review<\/em>, 108(3), pp.520\u2013532.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Riegals, C. (n.d.). What percentage of the UK population goes to Oxbridge?<\/em> [online] Quora. Available at: https:\/\/www.quora.com\/What-percentage-of-the-UK-population-goes-to-Oxbridge#:~:text=About%200.6%25%20%2D%20in%20rough%20numbers.&text=I%20crunched%20quite%20a%20lot [Accessed 11 Mar. 2024].<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Sutton Trust (2019). Elitist Britain 2019<\/em>. [online] Sutton Trust. Available at: https:\/\/www.suttontrust.com\/our-research\/elitist-britain-2019\/.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Ward, A. (2022). Parliament and government have a class problem<\/em>. [online] British Politics and Policy at LSE. Available at: https:\/\/blogs.lse.ac.uk\/politicsandpolicy\/parliament-and-government-have-a-class-problem\/.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Watson, C. (2020). House of Commons trends: How many women candidates become MPs? commonslibrary.parliament.uk<\/em>. [online] Available at: https:\/\/commonslibrary.parliament.uk\/house-of-commons-trends-how-many-women-candidates-become-mps\/.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The House of Parliament was coined with the term, ‘male, pale and stale’ following the May 2015 election – it<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1503,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-694","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorised"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.qub.ac.uk\/pb-happ\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/694","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.qub.ac.uk\/pb-happ\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.qub.ac.uk\/pb-happ\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.qub.ac.uk\/pb-happ\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1503"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.qub.ac.uk\/pb-happ\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=694"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.qub.ac.uk\/pb-happ\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/694\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":702,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.qub.ac.uk\/pb-happ\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/694\/revisions\/702"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.qub.ac.uk\/pb-happ\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=694"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.qub.ac.uk\/pb-happ\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=694"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.qub.ac.uk\/pb-happ\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=694"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}