THERE has been plenty of commentary from politicians and the media “commentariat” about the message that the voters of Eastleigh have delivered.

It does seem to me, however, that it is more than coincidence that each commentator’s interpretation of voters’ message bears a significant resemblance to the political analysis that those commentators have been peddling for some time.

To be blunt, they have extracted from the result what suits them and called it a message from the voters.

Personally, having tramped the doorsteps of Eastleigh myself, I am deeply sceptical about any discernible collective message: voters are individuals with very different motives for casting their vote in a particular way. Over the last three weeks I have been given all sorts of reasons by voters to explain why they are not voting for one party, but for another, or not voting at all.

Although many of these reasons seemed to me to be extraordinary, misguided, or contradictory, to the voters themselves they were quite logical. In any event they were all quite different.

Therefore, to take a step back and try and sum up all these quite different motivations into a discernible collective message strikes me as just mumbo-jumbo.

The only common theme I detected was that the voters appreciated this was a by-election and not a general election: that it provided an opportunity for caprice or self-indulgence; that they could abandon their traditional loyalties without serious consequences; in short, that they considered the result didn’t matter very much because they were not choosing a government.

So much for the message, but what about the consequences?

Well, political commentators and media pundits make their living by writing and saying very exciting things from time to time about momentous events, but for the most part they have to get by writing those exciting things about rather ordinary events like by-elections. There is an element of “crying wolf” about all this: having fulminated about the profound consequences of a number of earlier by-election results, none of which ensued, people are unlikely to get steamed up about what is said about this one.

“Very small earthquake in Hampshire. None dead,” would be the conclusion I would draw.

Of the specific complaints put to me on the doorsteps, by far the most common were immigration and too many people on welfare benefits. Inevitably some of those complaints will have translated into voting intentions and actual votes cast.

It would be perverse, however, to punish a government that is dealing vigorously with both complaints. An annual limit has been placed on non EU immigration and a points system to determine the sort of skilled people we allow in. The principal abuse – applying for student visas when really coming not to study, but to work – has been closed off.

Controlling immigration is a bit like steering a super tanker, it takes time to turn, but it is now turning. We have just seen the lowest net migration figures for the last two quarters, since statistics have been collected.

As for too many people on welfare, this Government is the first in generations that has set out to reduce welfare spending significantly, and seen it through.

Making work pay can be painful for many, as I know from my postbag and surgeries. The results are clear, however. Unemployment has fallen sharply despite the lack of economic growth. We now have the highest level of employment in the UK ever.

Even more telling is the fact that of the one million extra private sector jobs since the election, nine out of ten went to British workers (whereas, under the last administration, three-quarters of new jobs went to foreign workers).

On the two principal gripes put to me by voters in Eastleigh, I do not see any reason for the Government to change course at all: we are delivering what they say they want, however they may vote.