United Kingdom elections: Labour's crushing victory

LondonChange of political cycle in the United Kingdom after fourteen years of Conservative governments. Keir Starmer's Labour Party has achieved a resounding victory in this Thursday's general election. With the results from two constituencies still pending, Labour has obtained 412 seats, which far exceed the threshold for an absolute majority, set at 326. The party led by Starmer since spring 2020 has thus brought about a spectacular turnaround in the figures from the last election, held in 2019 (202 MPs), at the peak of Boris Johnson's popularity. Starmer has thus brought about a spectacular turnaround in the figures from the last election, held in 2019 (202 MPs), at the peak of Boris Johnson's popularity.

Labour has only increased its vote share by 2%. For their part, having lost 20% of their votes compared to the previous elections, the Conservatives' result is the worst in their 190-year history and, even so, they can feel relieved, as some polls predicted less than a hundred MPs. The still provisional data suggests they will obtain, at most, 122, although, for now, they only reach 121.

The vote share of the two main parties is the lowest in the country's electoral history: it barely exceeds 57.6%. For Labour it was 33.9% and for the Conservatives 23.7%. The characteristics of the electoral system cause enormous distortion in the translation into seats, as Keir Starmer's party achieves 63.7% of the seats while the Tories only get 18%. A distortion that greatly harms the interests of Nigel Farage's Reform Party, which with 15% of the votes obtains only 0.6% of the parliamentarians (4 seats for 4.1 million votes), roughly the same figures as the Greens (4 MPs for 1.9 million votes). On the opposite side, the Liberal Democrats benefit greatly: with 13% of the votes they have obtained 11% of the representatives. This landscape will once again open the debate on reforming the system of allocating representatives in the House of Commons.

The reactions to the tory disaster have not been long in coming. Shortly before five in the morning, local time, in his acceptance speech for his seat as a Member of Parliament, the still Prime Minister, Rishi Sunak, announced that he had already spoken with his successor to congratulate him. Mid-morning this Friday, he presented his resignation to Charles III after a brief speech in front of the door of number 10 Downing Street. In his last act as premier, Sunak apologized for the defeat, announced that he will step down as party leader once the mechanism to find a replacement is in place, boasted about the stability achieved in the last 20 months, and also stated: "It is important that, after 14 years in government, the Conservative Party rebuilds itself, but also that it assumes its crucial role in opposition professionally and effectively."

Events then accelerated, as immediately afterwards the monarch asked Keir Starmer to form a new government. Shortly after midday, local time, he arrived at Downing Street, thus becoming the fifth Labour premier in the country's history.

If the projection that the BBC is currently making is accurate, Labour will have 166 more MPs than the rest of the parties combined. Tony Blair's majority in 1997 was 179.

Addressing supporters from the Turbine Hall at Tate Modern, in central London, Starmer stressed this morning what the main purpose of his government should be: "We have achieved it. Change begins now," he said. And he added: "A mandate like this carries great responsibility. Our task is, nothing more and nothing less, to renew the ideas that sustain this country. And together we must do it. We must carry out a national renewal so that whoever you are, no matter where you started in your life, if you work hard, if you play by the rules, this country should offer you good opportunities".

The elected prime ministerresignation, last year, of Nicola SturgeonThe suicide of the 'Tories'

The devastating night for the conservatives, "difficult" in Rishi Sunak's words, is, as has already been pointed out, the worst in the party's 190-year history. To the point, for example, that it has obtained no representation in Wales and only three in Scotland. Sunak's strategy of advancing the elections has proven to be suicidal. Up to twelve government ministers have lost their seats and no fewer than eight secretaries of state have also fallen in the slaughter. Among the most relevant victims, the defeat of the former prime minister Liz Truss, who has lost her seat as a deputy, in southwest Norfolk (eastern England) by just 630 votes, stands out particularly.

For their part, the Liberal Democrats, the little brother of the three major British parties, have achieved very good results. At the moment they have obtained 71 seats in the Commons. In 2019 they only had 11.

Another of the night's big victims has been the Scottish National Party (SNP), which has only won 9 deputies out of the 45 it had as a result of the 2019 elections. Independence has contested the elections at a very difficult time, with the crisis it has been experiencing since the resignation, last year, of Nicola Sturgeon, the ongoing police investigation for alleged fraud in the party's finances affecting her husband, and with the replacement, less than ten weeks ago, of Prime Minister Humza Yousaf – Sturgeon's replacement – by John Swinney. In nine years, since 2015, Scottish independence has lost momentum. On this occasion, Scotland only had 56 constituencies at stake, three fewer than in 2019.

Two different parties from 2019

Beyond the MPs, the British have chosen parties different from those that ran in 2019. The conservatives have moved away from the center and have leaned to the right or far-right. Labour is also not Jeremy Corbyn's party – he has revalidated his seat, now as an independent –, who had excited young sectors of the population, but whom the majority of the country did not trust. The return of labour to the center, added to the exhaustion of fourteen years tories, many of which were chaotic due to Brexit and continuous internal disputes, has resulted in a radical change in the political landscape of the islands, only four and a half years after Boris Johnson achieved 365 MPs.

The other relevant data of the night has been the entry for the first time into the Commons of the xenophobic and extremist Nigel Farage, leader of the Reform Party. It was the eighth time he had tried, until now without success. The group has achieved four representatives. And Farage's objective, as he expressed in his acceptance speech of the mandate, is to become the "true" opposition to labor, to which he has almost declared war by assuring that "we are coming for them".