Tim Bale’s Blog- Electoral reform for the UK? Don’t bet on it, Financial Times, 3 June 2026.
- ‘Britain’s “ungovernable” decade’, Anadolu Ajansı, 21 May 2026.
- ‘Dumping Starmer won’t reverse Labour’s fortunes [unless….]’, New Statesman, 12 May 2026
- ‘Will Nigel Farage overtake the prime minister as the U-turn leader?’, Independent, 2 April 2026
- ‘Polarised and Powerful: Party Members in British Politics’, Political Insight, 18 March 2026.
- ‘Political treachery is a dangerous art. Streeting must perfect it if he wants to wear the crown’, Daily Telegraph, 16 February 2026.
- ‘The two bloc polarisation of Britain’s voters and Party members’, LSE British Politics Blog, 2 February 2026.
- ‘Ahead of seismic local elections, what we know about Reform’s ability to put boots on the ground for the campaign’, The Conversation, 20 January 2026
- ‘Churchill’s defection didn’t kill the Tories. Robert Jenrick’s certainly won’t’, Daily Telegraph, 19 January 2026.
- ‘The ten most surprising facts from the 2024 election revealed’, The Conversation, 15 December 2025.
Author Archives: tpbale
‘What they really think on Planet Tory’ (with Philip Cowley), Daily Telegraph, 1 February 2016
When The Telegraph broke the parliamentary expenses scandal back in 2009, many wondered what planet MPs were living on. In fact, they live on two. When it comes to their views on the EU, Tories in Westminster really are from … Continue reading
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Tagged Brexit, Conservative Party, David Cameron, EU referendum, Euroscepticism, MPs, Tories
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‘The Forgotten Cecil Parkinson’, New Statesman, 26 January 2016
When most people who were around in the 1980s think of Cecil Parkinson, they will recall only one thing – his affair with Sara Keays and his subsequent resignation. But he actually deserves to be remembered for far more than that. Indeed, … Continue reading
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Tagged Cecil Parkinson, Conservative Party, Margaret Thatcher
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‘Labour can’t win with Jeremy Corbyn – but he’s not the one to blame’, New Statesman, 21 January 2016.
I’m not so sure the commentariat as a whole got it wrong, but I do know that I did. I’m supposed to know something about the Labour party, but I didn’t see Jeremy Corbyn coming. In my book, Five Year Mission: the … Continue reading
‘Ideology is in the eye of the beholder: How British party supporters see themselves, their parties, and their rivals’ (with Paul Webb and Monica Poletti), LSE Politics and Policy,8 January 2016
If British Election Study figures are anything to go by, those feeling close to the country’s six biggest parties – the Conservatives, Labour, the SNP, the Lib Dems, UKIP and the Greens – make up around 15 per cent of … Continue reading
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Tagged Conservative Party, Greens, Labour Party, Liberal Democrats, party members, SNP, UKIP
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‘David Cameron has borrowed Harold Wilson’s tactics – will he share his fate?’, 7 January 2016
David Cameron was always going to do a Wilson. Pressed, like the political maestro who led Labour between 1963 and 1976 into holding a referendum as a last resort, he too has conducted a renegotiation which his opponents condemn as … Continue reading
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‘David Cameron’s EU free vote concession is inevitable, but important’, Telegraph, 6 January 2016
On a scale of one to ten, starting at crushingly predictable and running all the way through to complete and utter shock, David Cameron’s announcement that his colleagues would be permitted to campaign on either side of the EU referendum … Continue reading
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Who’s going to win Britain’s Brexit referendum?, UK in a Changing Europe, 1 December 2015
Prediction may be a mug’s game but it’s still great fun. And, when it comes to Britain’s vote on Brexit, it’s not even as if we have nothing to go on. There have already been loads of opinion polls on … Continue reading
‘Margaret Thatcher: the Authorised Biography. Volume Two: Everything She Wants’, Irish Times, 24 October 2015
Margaret Thatcher has been as lucky with her biographers as she was with her enemies. Her governments returned Britain to levels of unemployment it hadn’t seen since the 1930s and presumed it would never see again, yet she was able … Continue reading
A look back at the 2016 Labour Party Conference, Speri, 9 October 2015
Labour’s Conference in Brighton wasn’t quite a tale of two nations between whom, to borrow from Disraeli, ‘there is no intercourse and no sympathy; who are as ignorant of each other’s habits, thoughts, and feelings, as if they were dwellers … Continue reading
Notes from the Tory fringe, where everyone is playing nicely – for now, The Conversation, 6 October 2015
Welcome to the Tory Party conference in Manchester – as ever a curious mix of the nerdy, the nutty, the nasty, and the nice and normal. The latter (apologies to anti-austerity protesters everywhere but it’s true) are in the majority. … Continue reading
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Tagged Boris Johnson, Conservative Party, David Cameron, George Osborne, Theresa May
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Tim Bale's Blog 