Currently embattled Conservative U.K. Prime Minister Boris Johnson is running in the single digits behind Labour’s Sir Keir Starmer, but in the last several weeks has seen his leadership tested by revelations of senior Conservatives flouting their own COVID-19 rules in holding Christmas parties last year; as well as struggling to pass new COVID-19 measures with nearly a third of his caucus defying his direction and forcing him to rely on opposition support.

This comes after he was responsible for whipping his caucus to overturn a suspension on the former Conservative M.P. for North Shropshire, Owen Patterson, who resigned his seat after being accused of violating lobbying rules on behalf of two companies. Earlier Johnson faced controversy over expenses related to the refurbishment of his flat and a luxury vacation he took.

As Mr. Patterson’s resignation has trigged the by-election, the main question will be if over a century of solid Conservative voting history will be enough to overcome some ominous clouds in the middle of Johnson’s mandate.

In looking at the voting history of North Shropshire, and the earlier constituency that roughly encompassed the same area, Oswestry (which was in turn preceded by North Shropshire for most of the 19th century) it is impressive how long the Tory blue streak has continued.

First created in 1832 as a dual member constituency, North Shropshire initially had as one of their two M.P.s a Whig, John Coates, but was otherwise solid Tory through the constituency’s abolishment in 1885. The constituency of Oswestry compromised much the same area and continued much the same voting patterns, only being interrupted in a 1904 by-election where Liberal Allan Bright won a close vote, only to lose the seat to the Tories in the general election in 1906. While a few elections thereafter were close fought, by the 1930s the Conservatives routinely won with double digit leads, and the pattern continued through the reconstitution of the area back to North Shropshire in 1983, and saw a close race only during Labour’s 1997 landslide win, where the open seat saw Owen Patternson beat the Labour challenger by only 4 percentage points or 2,000 votes.

Beset by numerous controversies and scandals, by-elections are traditionally a way for constituencies to sometimes break free of traditional voting patterns and send a message to the Government without fear of unduly rocking the boat (if the Government’s majority is otherwise secure). It would be a combination of some conscious movement towards consolidating behind the Liberal Democratic candidate, Helen Morgan; plus general Tory disaffection and low turnout on their part that would likely give Ms. Morgan a narrow win. The Tory candidate who, if victorious, would likely have a narrow win as well, is Dr. Neil Shastri Hurst, a NHS surgeon who has pointedly condemned the Conservative Christmas festivities last year and promised to bring more funding for NHS services in the area. But while health services is the local issue, it is under the backdrop of the larger issue of Boris Johnson’s leadership that this election is likely to turn.

It is interesting to note that the characterization of the 1904 by-election producing the last non-Tory win in the area, as quoted through Wikipedia “The result was ‘a great surprise for both Conservatives and Liberals alike‘. Bright believed that the electorate had rejected the government, and that ‘the whole of Shropshire politics had been simply a policy of Tory bluff and the people seemed to have got tired of it‘.”

While there is no way that they could have anticipated the circumstances 117 years later, but should the Liberal Democrat pull out a win, the same might be written today leading one to wonder if history really does repeat itself.