United Kingdom general election, 1951

25 October 1951

All 625 seats in the House of Commons
313 seats needed for a majority

Turnout

82.6% (

1.3%)

	First party	Second party	Third party

Leader	Winston Churchill	Clement Attlee	Clement Davies
Party	Conservative	Labour	Liberal
Leader since	9 October 1940	25 October 1935	2 August 1945
Leader's seat	Woodford	Walthamstow West	Montgomeryshire
Last election	298 seats, 43.4%^[1]	315 seats	9 seats, 9.1%
Seats won	321^[2]	295	6
Seat change	22	20	3
Popular vote	13,717,851	13,948,385	730,546
Percentage	48.0%	48.8%	2.5%
Swing	5.6%	2.7%	6.6%

Colours denote the winning party, as shown in the main table of results. (Map does not show results in Northern Ireland)

Prime Minister before election

Clement Attlee
Labour

Subsequent Prime Minister

Winston Churchill
Conservative

The 1951 United Kingdom general election was held twenty months after the 1950 general election, which the Labour Party had won with a slim majority of just five seats. The Labour government called the general election for Thursday 25 October 1951 hoping to increase their parliamentary majority. However, despite winning the popular vote, the Labour Party was defeated by the Conservative Party who had won the most seats. This election marked the beginning of the Labour Party's thirteen-year spell in opposition, and the return of Winston Churchill as Prime Minister.

Background

Clement Attlee had decided to call the election after the King's concerns over leaving the country to go on his Commonwealth tour in 1952 with a government that had such a slim majority, that there was danger of a change of government in his absence.^[3] (As it transpired the King became too ill to travel and delegated the tour to his daughter Princess Elizabeth shortly before his death in February 1952.)

The Labour government, which by now had implemented most of its 1945 election manifesto, was now beginning to lose many cabinet ministers such as Ernest Bevin and Stafford Cripps due to old age. The Conservatives however, due to the previous year's election, appeared fresher, with more new MPs.

Campaign

While Labour began to have some policy divisions during the election campaign, the Conservatives ran an efficient campaign that was well-funded and orchestrated. Their manifesto Britain Strong and Free stressed that safeguarding "our traditional way of life" was integral to the Conservative purpose. Significantly, they did not propose to dismantle the welfare state or the National Health Service which the Labour Government had established.^[4] As for the Liberals, the poor election results in 1950 only worsened.^[5]

Four candidates were returned unopposed, all in Northern Ireland. This was the last general election in which any candidates were returned unopposed, although there have since been unopposed by-elections.^[6]

The subsequent Labour defeat was significant for several reasons: the party polled almost a quarter of a million votes more than the Conservatives and their National Liberal allies combined, won the most votes that Labour had ever won (as of 2017) and won the most votes of any political party in any election in British political history, a record not surpassed until the Conservative Party's victory in 1992. Despite this, it was the Conservatives who formed the next government with a majority of 17 seats. Under the first past the post electoral system, many Labour votes were "wasted" as part of large majorities for MPs in safe seats rather than into holding onto marginal seats. It should also be noted that most of Labour's overall popular vote margin can be accounted for as being the votes not polled by the Conservatives's Ulster Unionist allies in the four constituencies (all safe UUP seats) in which they were unopposed - the UUP would poll 166,400 votes in these four constituencies four years later. This was the fourth of five elections in the twentieth century where a party lost the popular vote, but won the most seats. The others were January 1910, December 1910, 1929 and February 1974; it also happened at the 1874 election.

Result

↓
321	295	6	3
Conservative/Liberal National	Labour	Lib	O

UK General Election 1951
			Candidates						Votes
Party		Leader	Standing	Elected	Gained	Unseated	Net	% of total	%	No.	Net %
	Labour	Clement Attlee	617	295	2	22	− 20	47.20	48.78	13,948,883
	Conservative	Winston Churchill	562	302	20	1	+ 19	48.32	44.27	12,659,712
	National Liberal	James Stuart	55	19¹	3	0	+ 3	3.04¹	3.70¹	1,058,138¹
	Liberal	Clement Davies	109	6	1	4	− 3	0.96	2.55	730,546
	Independent Nationalist	N/A	3	2	0	0	0	0.32	0.32	92,787
	Irish Labour	William Norton	1	1	1	0	+ 1	0.16	0.12	33,174
	Communist	Harry Pollitt	10	0	0	0	0	0.00	0.08	21,640
	Independent	N/A	6	0	0	0	0	0.00	0.07	19,791
	Plaid Cymru	Gwynfor Evans	4	0	0	0	0	0.00	0.04	10,920
	SNP	Robert McIntyre	2	0	0	0	0	0.00	0.03	7,299
	Independent Conservative	N/A	1	0	0	0	0	0.00	0.02	5,904
	Ind. Labour Party	Fred Barton	3	0	0	0	0	0.00	0.014	4,057
	British Empire	P. J. Ridout	1	0	0	0	0	0.00	0.006	1,643
	Anti-Partition	James McSparran	1	0	0	0	0	0.00	0.005	1,340
	United Socialist	Guy Aldred	1	0	0	0	0	0.00	0.001	411

Total votes cast: 28,596,594. All parties shown. Conservative result includes the Ulster Unionists.

¹ The National Liberals were in alliance with the Conservatives, bringing total Conservative strength to 321 seats (51.36%); votes total 13,717,850 (47.97%).

Government's new majority	17
Total votes cast	28,596,594
Turnout	82.6%

Votes summary

Popular vote

Labour			48.78%
Conservative			47.97%
Liberal			2.55%
Independent			0.43%
Others			0.26%

Headline Swing: 1.13% to Conservative

Seats summary

Parliamentary seats

Conservative			51.36%
Labour			47.20%
Liberal			0.96%
Others			0.48%

Transfers of seats

All comparisons are with the 1950 election.
No seats changed hands during the 1950-51 parliament.

From	To	No.	Seats
Labour	Labour (HOLD)	many
Labour	Liberal	1	Bolton West
Labour	Conservative	21	Barry, Battersea South, Bedfordshire South, Berwick and East Lothian, Bolton East, Buckingham, Conway, Darlington, Doncaster, Dulwich, King's Lynn, Manchester Blackley, Middlesbrough West, Norfolk South West, Oldham East, Plymouth Sutton, Reading North, Rochdale, Rutherglen, Wycombe, Yarmouth
Irish Nationalist	Irish Nationalist	1	Fermanagh and South Tyrone
Ind Republican	Ind Republican	1	Mid Ulster
Liberal	Labour	2	Anglesey, Meirioneth
Liberal	Liberal (HOLD)	6	Bolton West, Cardiganshire, Carmarthen, Huddersfield West, Montgomery, Orkney and Shetland
Liberal	Conservative	2	Eye, Roxburgh and Selkirk
Nat Liberal	Nat Liberal (HOLD)	16	Angus North and Mearns, Angus South, Bedfordshire South, Bradford North, Denbigh, Dumfriesshire, Fife East, Harwich, Holland with Boston, Huntingdonshire, Luton, Norfolk Central, Renfrewshire West, Ross and Cromarty, St Ives, Torrington
Conservative	Nat Liberal	1	Newcastle upon Tyne North
Conservative	Conservative (HOLD)	many
Speaker	Conservative	1	Hexham
Ulster Unionist	Irish Labour	1	Belfast West
Ulster Unionist	Ulster Unionist	9	North Antrim, South Antrim, Armagh, Belfast East, Belfast North, Belfast South, Down North, Down South, Londonderry

References

↑ Conservative 246 (35.2%), Unionist 26 (3.5%), National Liberal 16 (3.4%), UUP 10 (1.2%)
↑ Conservative 302 (44.3%), National Liberal 19 (3.7%)
↑ Judd, Dennis (2012). George VI. I.B. Tauris (paperback). p. 238. ISBN 978-1-78076-071-1. Judd writes that Attlee confirmed the king's anxiety in his own autobiography.
↑ Kynaston, David (2009). Family Britain 1951-7. London: Bloomsbury. p. 32. ISBN 9780747583851.
↑ "UK | UK Politics | The Basics | past_elections | 1951: Churchill back in power at last". BBC News. 2005-04-05. Retrieved 2013-10-05.
↑ "General Election Results 1885-1979". Election.demon.co.uk. Retrieved 2013-10-05.

Manifestos

CONSERVATIVE PARTY: 1951- 1951 Conservative manifesto.
Labour Party Election Manifesto - 1951 Labour Party manifesto.
The Nation's Task - 1951 Liberal Party manifesto.

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