UK By-elections - Political Significance

Political Significance

By-elections are often seen as tests of the popularity of the Government of the day and attract considerable media attention. Voters, knowing that the result will rarely affect a Government's majority in the Commons, may vote in ways different to their normal voting patterns at general elections. By-elections may reflect specific local issues, and often have lower turnout. As such, large changes in vote share can happen and the results of by-elections can affect or highlight political party's fortunes, as with the sequence of by-election victories by the Liberal Party in 1972/3, or the SNP's win in 1967 Hamilton by-election.

In some cases, an MP or MPs may deliberately trigger a by-election to make a political point, as when all the sitting Unionist MPs in Northern Ireland resigned together in 1986 or the Haltemprice and Howden by-election, 2008.