IT IS market day in Ely, a small city in Cambridgeshire. Locals throng stalls selling vegetables, Christmas decorations and old records. Only a few want to talk to the gaggle of Conservative Party activists urging them to support their candidate. Without breaking step, a man and a woman tell a campaigner that they are not local residents—odd, another remarks, as he could have sworn they live in his street. “They’re all in it for themselves,” says a brawny stallholder of politicians generally.

Many Britons want nothing to do with politics. In the hard-fought 2010 general election some 16m people eligible to vote did not do so. Turnout is lowest among the poor and the young. Ipsos MORI, a pollster, thinks only 58% of the working-class electorate voted in 2010, compared with 76% of professionals. Turnout among 18- to 24-year-olds was just 44%. Following a series of scandals over MPs’ expenses claims and a brutal economic slump, some reject politics on a point of principle. “No thanks, I don’t vote” is a common comment on doorsteps, canvassers say.

And yet, if strategists from Britain’s main parties are right, these disillusioned and indifferent folk could well decide the outcome of the next general election, scheduled for 2015. The Conservatives and the Labour Party are energetically courting them—and subtly changing their pitch in the process.

This is an about-turn. For decades political parties have concentrated on those most inclined to turn out. Tory activists assessed voters’ allegiances and likelihood to vote on a nine-point scale that dictated whether they should receive leaflets, visits and help getting to polling stations. Non-voters, even Conservative-minded ones, got a lower grade than those who were contemplating voting, even if the latter also said they supported a different party. Labour had similar systems. “If someone says they will not vote, then I make it the last conversation I have with them,” says a Labour MP in a marginal seat.

But changing electoral arithmetic means non-voters can no longer be ignored. The dominance of the two big parties is over (see chart). Winning an election once meant taking centrist votes from the other lot without offending core voters. But this has become trickier as the parties have built solid regional power bases—Labour in the north, Tories in the south. Although the Conservatives and Labour still hope to win votes from each other, polling by Lord Ashcroft, a Tory peer, suggests that the exchange of voters between the two parties has dwindled.

The two big parties can try to raid smaller ones. Labour is pursuing left-wing Liberal Democrat voters outraged by their party’s compromises in government. The Conservatives are trying to persuade defectors to the right-wing UK Independence Party to return to the fold. But strategists believe this is probably not enough to win either party a parliamentary majority. Non-voters, by contrast, could push them over the line. Each party sees something to like about these disaffected, mostly working-class Britons. Labour strategists like Marcus Roberts of the Fabian Society, a think-tank, point to non-voters’ wariness of big business and bankers, their worries about the rising cost of living and their affection for the National Health Service. Conservatives note that they disapprove of out-of-work benefits, taxes and immigration (non-voters may not turn up, but they do talk to pollsters). Still, winning them is hard. Non-voters tend to have a deep distrust for what they see as a self-serving elite in Westminster. YouGov, another pollster, asked some whether they would talk to an MP in a neighbouring seat on a long journey. “I do not talk to fuckwits on planes” was a typical answer. Only 7% of non-voters agreed with the statement: “Most MPs are basically honest”. To overcome this cynicism, generals on both sides urge their political troops to campaign noisily and visibly on local issues. Turn up to everything and invite prospective voters to meetings, advises one Labour candidate, “and for God’s sake provide tea.” Face-to-face contact with non-voters is much more effective than mailshots and phone calls, agrees David Skelton, a prominent Tory campaigner.

Emulating Barack Obama (though with much less money) Britain’s parties have hired organisers to build grassroots campaigns in crucial constituencies. The Conservatives have even recruited Jim Messina, the brains behind the Obama machine, to advise them. Labour has Arnie Graf, an American with decades of experience of running community campaigns in gritty bits of Chicago and Baltimore. In Preston, a northern town, his neighbourhood meetings at first attracted five people; now over 400 local residents attend.

Elsewhere, would-be Labour MPs have taken to championing credit unions and food banks. Many of their Conservative counterparts hold jobs fairs. Some Tory associations, including the one in Ely, are trying to overcome apathy by inviting local residents to help select candidates. Paul Bristow, one of those shortlisted there, hopes that the final selection on December 7th will attract at least 100 non-members.

Base instincts

If successful, such innovations could boost turnout and upend British politics. For years, parties have run elections with an iron grip, precision-engineering policies and messages for broadcast. But if non-voters are as important as some think, such methods will be less important. No amount of advertising will win their trust; instead, the parties will need lots of boots on the ground. That is good news for Labour, with its larger, younger membership, and bad news for the greying, shrinking Conservative Party.

British politics would undoubtedly benefit from greater trust and voter engagement. Perhaps the new emphasis on non-voters will help advance both. Yet there is danger for parties in chasing those disinclined to vote. History suggests that when politicians play to core voters they make bad policies; far better to colonise the political middle ground. But the parties seem to be convincing themselves that banging on about fat cats (in Labour’s case) and immigrants (in the Conservatives’ case) can in effect broaden their political base. By seeing in non-voters echoes of their most basic instincts, they risk being led away from the sensible centre. That way ruin lies.