All change in the House? The profile of candidates and MPs in the 2015 British general election

Lamprinakou, Chrysa and Morucci, Marco and Campbell, Rosie and Van Heerde-Hudson, Jennifer (2016) All change in the House? The profile of candidates and MPs in the 2015 British general election. Parliamentary Affairs, 70 (2). 207–232. ISSN 0031-2290 (https://doi.org/10.1093/pa/gsw030)

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Abstract

Drawing on data from the Parliamentary Candidates UK project, we profile the socio-demographic characteristics of parliamentary candidates standing in 2015 and compare elected MPs to previous cohorts since 1979. We argue that the 2015 cohort of candidates largely resembles the archetypal candidate identified by Durose et al. (2013, Parliamentary Affairs, 66, 246–267). Despite smaller parties’ campaign rhetoric of a ‘new kind of politics’, parties across the spectrum offer up very similar candidate profiles. We find a narrowing of occupational backgrounds, with fewer candidates and MPs from manual occupations, and an increasing percentage of candidates and MPs with a university education. Competition across the parties, particularly in terms of the selection of women and black and minority ethnic (BME) candidates, has positive consequences for the representativeness of Parliament. However, despite a record number of women and BME MPs elected, Parliament remains disproportionately white and male.

  • Item type:Article
    ID code:64422
    Dates:
    Date
    Event
    24 October 2016
    Published
    24 October 2016
    Published Online
    18 August 2016
    Accepted
    Subjects:Political Science
    Department:UNSPECIFIED
    Depositing user: Pure Administrator
    Date deposited:12 Jun 2018 13:01
    Last modified:18 Apr 2024 00:22
    Related URLs:
    URI:https://strathprints.strath.ac.uk/id/eprint/64422
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