1950 United Kingdom general election

1950 United Kingdom general election

← 1945 23 February 1950 1951 →
← outgoing members elected members →
All 625 seats in the House of Commons 313 seats needed for a majority
Opinion polls
Turnout	83.9% (11.1 pp)
First party Second party Third party   Leader Clement Attlee Winston Churchill Clement Davies Party Labour Conservative Liberal Leader since 25 October 1935 9 October 1940 2 August 1945 Leader's seat Walthamstow West[a] Woodford Montgomeryshire Last election 393 seats, 47.7% 208 seats, 39.1%[b] 12 seats, 9.0% Seats won 315 298[note 1] 9 Seat change 78 90 3 Popular vote 13,226,176 12,494,404 2,621,487 Percentage 46.1% 43.4% 9.1% Swing 1.6% 4.3% 0.1%
Colours denote the winning party
Composition of the House of Commons after the election
Prime Minister before election Clement Attlee Labour Prime Minister after election Clement Attlee Labour

The 1950 United Kingdom general election was the first to be held after a full term of a majority Labour government. The general election was held on Thursday 23 February 1950, and was also the first to be held following the abolition of plural voting and university constituencies. The government's lead over the Conservative Party shrank dramatically, and Labour was returned to power but with an overall majority significantly reduced from 146 to just 5. There was a 2.8% national swing towards the Conservatives, who gained 90 seats. Labour called another general election the following year, which the Conservative Party won, returning Churchill to government after six years in opposition.

Turnout increased to 83.9%, the highest turnout in a UK general election under universal suffrage,^[1] and representing an increase of more than 11% in comparison to 1945.

It was also the first general election to be covered on television, although no recording was made of the live broadcast, which was the standard practice at the time. Richard Dimbleby hosted the BBC coverage of the election, which he would later do again for the 1951, 1955, 1959 and the 1964 general elections. On this occasion, Dimbleby was joined in the BBC Alexandra Palace studios by R. B. McCallum, Fellow of Pembroke College, Oxford, and author of The British General Election of 1945, and David Butler, research student of Nuffield College. The first election night programme ran from 10:45 pm until just after 1:00 am.^[2]

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