For years, Labour has generally been associated with the left and more liberal values, while the Conservatives have traditionally represented the right, with a stronger focus on traditional values and a smaller role for the state. This is what we would call a two-party system: two major parties dominating elections, government and, importantly, the House of Commons. This is what most people will associate with British politics, seeing two leaders opposite one another in the House of Commons with an old man shouting, ‘ORDER! ORDER! ORRRRRDERRRRR!’ Within this two-party system we have seen some influential figures dominate the political scene: Margaret Thatcher and Tony Blair.

Love them or hate them, both politicians completely changed the political landscape and left behind legacies that are still talked about today. We even have words for the political philosophies they represented: Thatcherism and New Labour.

Tony Blair became leader of the Labour Party in 1994 and went on to lead the party to three consecutive general election victories in 1997, 2001 and 2005. Blair famously rebranded Labour as ‘New Labour’, moving the party towards the political centre in an attempt to appeal to a broader range of voters. His governments introduced a number of significant policies, including the National Minimum Wage and increased spending on public services.

But Blair’s time in office was far from controversy-free. One of the most divisive parts of his premiership was the UK’s involvement in the 2003 Iraq War, which remains one of the most debated decisions of his time in office.

Then there was Margaret Thatcher…

Thatcher became the UK’s first female Prime Minister in 1979 and led the Conservatives to three consecutive general election victories in 1979, 1983 and 1987.

Her governments introduced policies focused heavily on privatisation, reducing the power of trade unions and limiting state intervention in the economy. Supporters saw this as a major shift towards a more free-market economy, while critics argued that her policies contributed to increased inequality and the decline of traditional industries in some parts of the country. Her influence was so significant that Thatcherism is still used today to describe her political and economic philosophy.

What does this have to do with two-party systems, I hear you ask? Thatcher and Blair represent a period where Labour and the Conservatives were able to dominate British politics, with smaller parties struggling to make the same impact.

But if Thatcher and Blair represented the height of two-party politics, recent political developments raise a pretty big question:

Are we finally moving away from it?

Nigel Farage is one of the most talked-about politicians in modern British politics, for the right reasons or wrong reasons, you tell me… After previously leading UKIP and becoming one of the most prominent campaigners for Brexit, Farage is now the leader of Reform UK. Reform has positioned itself as an alternative to both Labour and the Conservatives, putting issues such as immigration, economic growth and getting people back into work at the centre of its political message.

At the other end of the political spectrum, the Green Party has also been gaining attention. The Greens place a strong focus on climate change, environmental protection and social justice. Under its new leader, Zack Polanski, the party has attracted increased attention, particularly online and among younger voters. Historically, however, the Greens have struggled to translate their support into large numbers of seats in Parliament. The 2024 General Election changed that slightly, with the party winning four seats, its best ever result at a general election.

Reform and the Greens are very different politically, but they have something important in common: they are challenging the idea that British politics has to revolve around Labour and the Conservatives. Some people would argue that both parties spend almost as much time attacking Labour and the Conservatives as they do promoting their own ideas…

So, what happens to our voting system?

For a long time, voters were much more likely to have a strong attachment to one political party. This is known as partisan alignment - essentially, having a long-term loyalty or identification with a particular political party. You might vote Labour because your parents always voted Labour or Conservative because your family had always been Conservative. Sometimes it was linked to social class, occupation or simply a political identity you had grown up with. But that seems to be changing. More voters appear to be less tied to one particular party and more willing to switch between parties depending on the election, the leader or the issue.

Political parties don’t always fit neatly into the boxes they once did. Parties are constantly trying to appeal to different groups of voters, which can sometimes mean moving away from their traditional political positions. If you vote for a party because they align with your values, but then they move the goalposts after they’re elected, is that a little misleading? Or in Instagram and X’s opinion – the most traitorous and disgusting behaviour only punishable by stoning?

Labour’s move towards the political centre under Keir Starmer has been criticised by some on the left, who argue that the party has moved away from traditional Labour policies in an attempt to appeal to more moderate voters Similar to how Tony Blair successfully repositioned Labour in the 1990s. Although, I don’t know if we can say the same for Starmer, particularly given his resignation in June 2026. But if voters are becoming less loyal to the traditional parties and smaller parties are gaining support, what could that actually mean for the way Britain is governed?

This is where things get interesting (I think). If smaller parties continue to gain support, we could see British politics become increasingly multi-party. Instead of one party winning enough seats to govern alone, we could see more elections where no party wins an outright majority. This could mean we could see coalition governments.

A coalition government is where two or more political parties agree to work together to govern. We have already seen this in recent British politics, most famously between David Cameron’s Conservatives and Nick Clegg’s Liberal Democrats from 2010 to 2015. Coalition governments can sometimes be less stable and may find it harder to agree on policy. Personally, I don’t think Nigel Farage and Andy Burnham would gel particularly well around a Cabinet table.

The question is whether Britain is actually heading towards this kind of political landscape - or whether Labour and the Conservatives will simply adapt and remain the two dominant forces they have been for generations. Will people be too scared to put their faith into a new party?

Labour and the Conservatives have dominated British politics for generations, but cracks are beginning to show. Voters are becoming less loyal, smaller parties are becoming louder, and Westminster is looking a little less predictable than it once did. Is the two-party system dying? Maybe. Is it sweating nervously? Almost certainly.

We will see. Thanks for reading, see you next timeee 😊

I have contemplated creating some form of political platform for quite some time, but in a world where political opinions are increasingly shaped by ChatGPT, TikTok and whoever happens to have the loudest voice online, I felt like I didn’t want to add to the noise. I wanted to create somewhere that politics could actually be understood, rather than simply argued about.

So, welcome to my blog! I thought I would take a moment to introduce myself. I am a 22-year-old woman with a love for politics, and feels like the world of politics has changed detrimentally. I would (hopefully) like to bring some life back into it. It’s not all doom and gloom!

The world of politics can be a scary place. From an early age, all I heard was, ‘it’s not what you know, it’s who you know.’ I want to squash this barbaric narrative. There is power in knowing. There is nothing more powerful than understanding the world around you and forming your own opinions. The issue with our generation is the loud voices shouting hate, making it increasingly difficult to separate fact from opinion. Being well-informed and using your voice for good is something I strongly believe in. Everyone’s views are different, but as long as you know the facts and form your own opinion based on them, that’s what matters!!

This week, I will be discussing what has happened in the crazy world of politics, giving you the chance to form your own opinions rather than being influenced by the minority who have a voice simply because of ‘who they know’. You don’t need to know everything about politics. You just need to know enough to start asking the right questions.

A big topic on everyone’s lips at the moment is AI. As much as we all hate to admit it, we all actively use ChatGPT, Copilot etc. etc., but AI is becoming an issue for us all. Everyone can become an ‘expert’ on a topic in two minutes, and sometimes, what we’re being told may not be completely accurate.

The UK government has historically taken a relatively light-touch approach to AI regulation, relying heavily on voluntary agreements and existing regulators. But that approach is now being tested. Our AI Minister, Kanishka Narayan, is a relatively new position in its current form, having been appointed Minister of State for Artificial Intelligence in July 2026. He has said that the UK is open to stronger regulation of advanced AI if voluntary safeguards are not enough to protect the public.

The UK has also taken a strong stance on harmful ‘deepfakes’. It is now a criminal offence to create or request the creation of non-consensual intimate deepfake images of adults, and the government is also moving to criminalise the creation and supply of ‘nudification’ tools used to generate these images.

But there are still so many questions about what AI will actually become capable of, and whether our laws can keep up with it. AI isn’t really a future issue anymore. It’s already affecting the jobs we apply for, the information we consume and even what we can trust online. And let’s be honest, we’re only at the beginning.

There is growing pressure to reform the student loan system, with the government itself acknowledging problems with the current system. Education Secretary Lucy Powell has announced a review of student finance, raising questions about whether the current system is actually working for students, graduates and universities.

Why is this happening now? Well, the student loan is often described as being more like an extra tax than a traditional loan, something young people are having to balance alongside the cost-of-living crisis, saving for a house and one of the biggest housing crises in generations.

Student loans don’t work like a normal bank loan. You only start repaying once you earn above a certain threshold, and you repay 9% of everything you earn above it. For Plan 2 graduates, that threshold is now £29,385.

And then comes the slightly confusing part: interest.

For Plan 2 loans, the current interest rate ranges from 3.2% to 6.2%, depending on your income. If you earn £30,000, you’re only just above the repayment threshold, so your current interest rate is 3.2%.

So, if you earned £30,000, you would only repay around £55 a year, because you’re only £615 above the repayment threshold, and you repay 9% of that £615. But if you had £50,000 of student debt, around £1,600 of interest could be added to your balance over the same year.

So yes, you could be making your monthly student loan payments, watching money leave your payslip every month, and still owe more than you did at the start of the year.

And this is the part of the student loan system I think we need to talk about more. We call it a ‘loan’, but it doesn’t behave like a normal loan. You can be doing exactly what the system asks of you, earning, repaying and contributing, while the amount you owe continues to grow.

For a generation already trying to navigate rising rents, a housing crisis and the cost of living, it’s worth asking: is this really a loan we’re expected to pay back, or is it simply another tax on becoming educated?

Something else that has caught my attention this week is the growing debate around devolution.

Devolution means taking some power away from Westminster and giving it to governments and politicians in different parts of the UK, so decisions can be made closer to the people they actually affect. We saw one of the biggest changes to the UK’s political system under Tony Blair’s Labour government in the late 1990s, when Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland were given their own devolved institutions with powers over areas such as health and education. These institutions began operating in 1999.

Fast forward almost 30 years and the argument is still going. Andy Burnham’s government has been talking about putting more power closer to people’s lives, rather than having everything decided from Westminster. This could mean more control for regions over things that genuinely affect our everyday lives, from transport and skills, to housing and local investment. This week, the government has also announced plans for cheaper bus fares outside London, with a £2 cap from January 2027, showing how national government can use its power to support local communities.

But here’s where it gets interesting: does giving regions more power actually give ordinary people more power? Or are we simply moving decisions from one group of politicians to another? Devolution has already completely changed the way the UK is governed, but we’re still figuring out how much power should sit in Westminster - and how much should sit closer to home.

And perhaps that’s a debate our generation should be paying more attention to. Because if politics is supposed to work for us, shouldn’t we have more of a say in the decisions that affect our everyday lives?

Anyways, that’s enough from me. See you next time!

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