The Fall of Coal and the Fight for Rights

To pull off its landslide victory in last week’s election, Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s Conservative Party flipped dozens of districts in the “red wall” of British politics — a gritty stronghold of coal and factory towns that had supported the Labour Party for decades. Our correspondent traveled across the United Kingdom to understand what the region’s political realignment may foretell about the future of the country.

Guest: Patrick Kingsley, an international correspondent for The New York Times, who spoke with constituents in Shirebrook, England. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.

Background reading:

• “Votes for the pro-Brexit Conservatives had 10 times the effective power of votes for the anti-Brexit Liberal Democrats.” Our columnist writes that this is thanks to the electoral system used in Britain and the United States.
• On a road trip from London to Glasgow, our correspondent found a country longing for a past that may be impossible to revive.

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