1987 used to be a pivotal election, frequently referenced. The birth of modern media management, the death of the Alliance and a story of how one inaccurate leaked set of poll figures could panic a whole party; this was an election full of drama and long term significance.
But it is also now an example of how much evidence and knowledge dies if it predates the internet.
Because 1987 was the election when the exit poll got it wrong, but that was forgotten rather than wheeled out, tweeted about and dissected in the lull when people were arguing over the 2015 one, and then the 2017 one, as if there were no previous experiences relevant to mention.
Because 1987 was the election when there were many constituency opinion polls, including repeated ones in some seats, but that was forgotten in the debates over constituency polling in 2015 – with the debates carried out instead as if regular constituency polling in a general election was a new thing rather than something for which there is a goodly pile of historic data to look back to.
Because 1987 was the election at the end of a Parliament when one of the leading reputable pollsters used to ask about voter’s views of personalities before asking voting intention, something omitted in the ignorance-inducing outrage that doing so now must surely be a signed of rigged, push polling.
Because 1987 was also an election where a controversial Labour leader under remorseless tabloid attack overhauled their image in the public’s eyes massively, scared the Conservative Prime Minister, rescued his party from a possibly terminal cataclysm – and still lost.
1987 should be our constant companion in talking about recent British politics. But it isn’t.
So file 1987 along with Eugene Burdick, FWS Craig and Anthony Price in the curiously forgotten pile.
