David Cameron has presided over the biggest exodus of one-term MPs of any party leader in a generation, an analysis for The Times shows.
Nine Conservatives who were first elected in 2010 have either already left or have said that they will step down after only a single term. Many in Westminster expect more Tory resignations.
The departures give the prime minister the worst retention rate since Commons records began.
Sir John Major and Margaret Thatcher lost only three MPs after their first terms, according to the House of Commons library. After Tony Blair’s new Labour landslide in 1997, only two of his MPs quit four years later.
Although accurate records do not go back before 1979, academics believe that Mr Cameron’s record is the worst of any prime minister since 1945.
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Among MPs, a common complaint is a lack of respect from the party management for backbenchers.
“We all know why they’re going,” said one disheartened member of the 2010 cohort of his departing colleagues. “We’ve got some seriously talented people who’ve got here and found themselves completely ignored. Whereas if you’re part of Cameron’s inner set, you’re sorted.”
Philip Lee, who was elected as the MP for Bracknell in 2010, said: “The man-management within the parliamentary party could have been better.”
Others feel hurt that their talents have been overlooked. “There’s a sense that you come in, having been relatively successful in your profession or running a business, and you enter parliament and suddenly it’s like going back to school,” one Tory MP said.
However, such complaints met with little sympathy from one academic, who argued that MPs needed to be more realistic. “Some of the Tories who came in 2010 were used to being powerful in their professions or in the business world and were not ready to put up with what the institution is like,” the researcher said.
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Philip Cowley, from the University of Nottingham, said that some MPs were worn down by having to deal with the repercussions of the expenses scandal. He also suggested that MPs were leaving “because they don’t think they’ve got a chance of holding the seat”.