Tim Bale’s Blog- “End of the Brexit era? Burnham’s pivot back to Europe”, Anadolu Ajansı, 7 October 2026.
- “Burnham’s proposed electoral reform could have unpredictable effects”, LSE Blog, 6 October 2026.
- “The Keminaissance is a myth. The Tories are still like a weird uncle”, Bright Blue, 2 October.
- “Members of right‑leaning parties prefer leaders with ‘dark triad’ personality traits” (with Paul Webb and Stavroula Chrona), The Conversation, 18 September, 2026.
- “A fractured Union? Scotland, Wales, and Northern Ireland first ministers meeting”, Anadolu Ajansı, 17 September 2026.
- “Can’t you do it?”, Review of “Sunak at 10” by Anthony Seldon and Tom Egerton, Literary Review, 2 September 2026.
- “Hands off the constitution, Andy”, Unherd, 18 August 2026
- ‘Why Nigel Farage is resigning as an MP, only to stand again – expert analysis: Self-pity and self-obsession’, The Conversation, 7 July 2026.
- ‘There’s one thing that could revive Farage’s fortunes’, Independent, 29 June 2026.
- ‘Migration, Brexit, and Starmer’s exit: Inside Britain’s political meltdown’, Anadolu Agency, 23 June 2026
Author Archives: tpbale
‘The ten most surprising facts from the 2024 election revealed’, The Conversation, 15 December 2025.
1. Labour lost the campaign Labour won the election but its support fell a lot more than any other party’s during the campaign period. Labour started the campaign 25 percentage points ahead of the Conservatives and ended it just 15 points ahead. … Continue reading
‘Our survey of Green party members suggests Zack Polanski has the mandate to take his party in a more radical direction’, (with Paul Webb and Stavroula Chrona) The Conversation, 3 September 2025
Thanks to the media interest in his election as leader of the Green party of England and Wales, there’s now plenty of information available about Zack Polanski, the so-called “eco-populist” who won a landslide victory over his arguably more moderate rivals. … Continue reading
‘Even tactical voting will not help Labour survive a Tory-Reform pact’, Independent, 3 December 2025.
As the English philosopher RG Collingwood didn’t quite say, “the only clue to what a man can do is what a man has done”. Given that Nigel Farage denied he would do any kind of deal with Boris Johnson’s Conservatives – until, … Continue reading
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Tagged Conservative Party, Nigel Farage, reform-uk, uk-politics
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‘A Reform UK government isn’t inevitable’, Interview with LSE’s Joanna Bale (no relation!), 18 September 2025.
With Reform’s recent success in local elections and a parliamentary by-election, do you think we’re witnessing a temporary populist surge or the beginning of a longer-term realignment in British politics? I’m rather cautious about the idea of a realignment or, … Continue reading
The memoirs of a whip in love with his leaders’, Political Quarterly, 30 June 2025.
Ungovernable: The Political Diaries of a Chief Whip, by Simon Hart. Macmillan. 368 pp. £25.00 It is a truth universally acknowledged that any book purporting to be a revelatory insider account of contemporary British politics must be in want of a … Continue reading
‘Norman Tebbit carried a torch for a “true-blue” politics now embraced by Nigel Farage’, Independent, 8 July 2025
They say “never meet your heroes” – but meeting your antiheroes can be absolutely fascinating. At least, that was my experience when I met Norman Tebbit. How could it not have been? Already branded a “semi-house-trained polecat” as an opposition MP, once in … Continue reading
‘Why we need to halt “hard right” in its tracks’, The Loop, 10 July 2025.
Whatever passes for the centre right these days is in serious danger of being displaced or even replaced by the far right – most often by politicians whose questionable commitment to the checks and balances that characterise liberal democracy and … Continue reading
‘Why are Tories suddenly in favour of proportional representation?’, The Independent, 25 June 2025.
here’s an increasing disconnect between those who want to run the country and the rest of us who merely live in it – and it seems to be making us more likely to call for a change to the way we … Continue reading
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Tagged coalition-government, democracy, Elections, electoral-reform, fptp, politics, pr, UK
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‘London isn’t a Labour city any more — the three key questions that new polling raises’, The Standard, 24 June 2025.
“London is a Labour city” was always something of an exaggeration but it’s even more misleading today than it has been for quite a while. Polling just released by the Mile End Institute (MEI) at Queen Mary University of London … Continue reading
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Tagged keir-starmer, Labour Party, london, mei, politics, Polling, uk-politics
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‘Starmer’s immigrant rhetoric and politics of migration’, Anadolu, 23 May 2025.
The decision last week by British Prime Minister Keir Starmer to announce a headline-grabbing tightening of the UK’s immigration regime – and some of the tough talk in which he couched that announcement – is not simply a knee-jerk reaction … Continue reading
