Labour’s win in Newport West will make the Tories even more wary about a snap general election

Though not naturally fertile territory for Plaid Cymru, the Liberal Democrats or the Greens, there was some encouragement for these pro-Remain parties in their increased shares of the vote

Unless they are “sensational”, by-elections usually get a bit overlooked.

This is a pity, because they are, as the politicians always say, “real votes in real ballot boxes”, as opposed to mere opinion polls.

At the very least, they can add some corroboration to the messages that arise from polling, but they can also add some clues about other trends.

So it is with the Newport West by-election, fairly safely held by Ruth Jones in a seat that has been Labour since 1987. The win was not surprising. (If nothing else, the Labour whips will be grateful for another supporter – and a pro-European at that – in the division lobbies, scene of some close votes lately.)

Still, the Labour vote did slip somewhat – down 12.7 percentage points, in sharp contrast to the performance of Ukip, represented by the well-known Neil Hamilton, who managed to push the party’s vote share up from a risible 2.5 per cent at the 2017 general election to a more respectable (and deposit saving) 8.6 per cent now.

Technically, that means a swing from Labour to Ukip of 9.4 per cent.

However, leader Gerard Batten and the Ukip faithful should be cautious about taking too much encouragement from that figure. It is reasonable to assume that Labour voters might have stayed home disproportionately on the grounds that the by-election result was probably a foregone conclusion.

The personal vote accorded to the late Paul Flynn would have been a factor in depressing the Labour showing too. The weather was also inclement.

By contrast, all the intense media coverage of Brexit appears to have pumped up Ukip supporters into going to the polls as a protest, presumably, against the current postponement (or “betrayal” as Ukip have it) of Brexit.

Their showing is a necessary reminder that there is still a consciously hard-Brexit constituency out there and that any assessment of changing views on Brexit needs to be very careful.

However, the Ukip share of the vote in this traditional industrial seat – the sort of place they used to expect to be solid challengers – was much lower than where it stood as recently as the 2015 general election, when they won 12.3 per cent of the vote. It should also be contrasted with the 56 per cent Leave vote in the 2016 referendum.

What’s more, Neil Hamilton was not challenged by anyone from Nigel Farage’s new Brexit Party, who might well have split the pro-Leave vote.

Ultimately, Ukip failed by a considerable margin in their aim of pushing the Conservatives into third place. Nevertheless, the fall in the Tory vote (down 8 percentage points), though less severe than Labour, should confirm Conservative Party managers in their caution about another snap election.

While Newport West was no annihilation, we can perhaps conclude that the recent record of Theresa May’s government has not prompted any real progress at the ballot box since the 2017 snap election. (The Labour/Conservative vote split in this by-election was reminiscent of the 2010 general election result, which gave us a hung parliament.)

Though not naturally fertile territory for Plaid Cymru, the Liberal Democrats or the Greens, there was some encouragement for them in their increased shares of the vote. Between them, these three vocally anti-Brexit groups garnered 13.5 per cent of the vote. Apparently, some 7 per cent of the electorate in Newport West have signed the Revoke Article 50 petition.

Overall, the result of this by-election (especially looking at the Lab/Con shares) suggests that the next general election would not see an overall working majority for either main party.

It indicates too that a modest revival for the likes of Ukip and the Lib Dems, plus the intervention of a Brexit party or the Independent Group/Change UK could yield some quite unpredictable and perverse results in more marginal constituencies than Newport West.

The nation’s politics are looking very fractured indeed.