On 17 December 2024, it will be five years since parliament convened after the last UK general election in 2019. If this parliament has not been formally dissolved by then, dissolution would at that point become automatic. A general election would follow after 25 working days. Strictly speaking, the last possible date for the next UK general election is therefore Tuesday 28 January 2025.
In practice, the next election is unlikely to take place then. For one thing, UK elections traditionally occur on Thursdays, though this is only a convention observed since 1935. (Five of the six elections immediately before 1935 took place on other days; so, in principle, could the next one.) Nevertheless, the fact remains that the next general election may well be as much as 14 months away.
No one who watched the chancellor’s autumn statement on the economy this week could doubt that the two major parties are now in full general election mode. Jeremy Hunt’s announcements were a classic pre-election “live now, pay later” package aimed at seducing voters and embarrassing the opposition. There is likely to be more in the budget next March. There were big upfront tax cuts for businesses and workers. But these are a deliberate hospital pass to a potential Labour government, since the tax cuts would be financed by post-election spending cuts wholly unmentioned by the chancellor. Yet Labour is now in an election battle formation of its own too.
The shadow chancellor, Rachel Reeves, signalled a broader charge this week, based less on Mr Hunt’s announcements than 13 years of Conservative economic management. The questions that people will ask at the next election are simple, she concluded. Do they feel better off after 13 years? Do health, education and policing work better?
Amid the shoutiness of the Commons, the rival pitches were familiar. Better the devil you know from Mr Hunt. Time for a change with Ms Reeves. Giveaways from the Tories. The long, long night is over from Labour. The election battleground is getting more traditional too: a Conservative party that aims to shrink the state and cut taxes against a Labour party that will hopefully prioritise the protection and strengthening of the public services.
The choice is extremely clear. But do we need another 14 months of this argument conducted in these terms? Absolutely not. Politics is already in low enough repute without a year or more of the parties endlessly trading attack lines in this way. This would do nothing to repair a lack of trust that will haunt and hobble every future government until the problem is properly addressed.
Britain should have an early general election, not a late one. We do not need an election in 2023. But we should not be forced to wait until 2025 either. The 2024 election should be in spring, not autumn. This is not just because Britain needs a new government, although it does, but because voters should not be condemned to the year-long election campaign that the events of this week have so obviously signalled. The country seems to know its own mind. It will soon be time to bring it on, for all our sakes.
