The struggle against climate change is, metaphorically and meteorologically, heating up. Globally, 2023 was the warmest year on record, with temperature rises exceeding the 1.5C limit deemed necessary to avoid the most extreme consequences of atmospheric heating. Both Labour and the Conservatives have rolled-back high-profile green commitments in recent months. Is this smart politics? Are voters really all that enthusiastic about the country's promise to hit Net Zero emissions by 2050, or are they more concerned with relief from the current cost-of-living crisis?

Will Brexit still matter in the upcoming general election, and if so, how? The 2019 general election marked a high watermark in the realignment of the electorate around the Leave and Remain sides of the EU referendum. Since then, however, politicians resist talking about Brexit, and new issues and embarrassments for the government have shaped the political agenda: the Covid 19 pandemic, parties in Downing Street, the Liz Truss mini-budget, and the cost-of-living crisis.

Recent news from Scotland suggests the end of an era. The Scottish National Party (SNP), which has dominated politics north of the English border since the 2014 independence referendum, has suffered a chaotic year and now trails Labour in opinion polls for the first time in almost a decade. The next election could well see the same party win a majority of seats in England, Scotland and Wales for the first time since 2005. Does the SNP's decline mean that their dream of independence is over and that the union is now safe?

The relationship between gender and political choice is complex. Historically women tended to lean more conservative, whilst men were more left-leaning. In recent elections, however, this gender gap has reversed, bringing Britain more in line with patterns seen in the US and other postindustrial democracies. The emergence of this ‘modern gender gap’ pits increasingly left-liberal leaning young women against their right-leaning young male counterparts. But is this difference durable or transitory? Is it just confined to the younger generations? What is driving these changes?

The UK constitution appears to lurch from crisis to crisis. The last seven years have seen the UK negotiate Brexit, a global pandemic, threats to the Union, and a series of political crises that saw three Prime Ministers in one year. These events tempt calls for reform. Surely the UK's constitution is more populist than democratic and will remain so without long-lasting constitutional form, perhaps even moving to a codified constitution with strong, legal protections of federalism, democracy, and human rights?

The British political landscape on immigration before Brexit had a number of stable features: the public disliked migration; politicians from both parties tended to accept (if not actively support) higher migration levels than voters preferred; this mismatch generated electoral disruption when the issue rose up the agenda, in particular through mobilisation on the radical right and far right; and this initially intense public scepticism was gradually being eroded by demographic change.

British electoral geography has profoundly changed over the past decades. Place has become central to the language of elections and policy offerings from parties. Political divides have opened up between voters in locations strongly connected to global growth and those that are not. How do place-based factors matter for voting behaviour, and which political attitudes do they operate through?

The next UK general election looks set to be fought in a context of economic turmoil not seen in the UK since the 2010 election. However, the public mood toward public spending has dramatically shifted since then. Public services and the cost-of-living are at the forefront of voters’ worries, and majorities say they support increases in public spending even though the tax burden is historically high. How do voters form attitudes on economic policy and assess its trade-offs? What role did Brexit, Covid-19 and the 2022 ‘mini-budget’ play in shifting the grounds of the economic debate?