The centre-left Labour won a massive majority in the 650-seat parliament.

Rishi Sunak’s Conservatives suffered the worst performance in the party’s long history as voters punished them for a cost of living crisis, failing public services, and a series of scandals.

“We did it,” Starmer said in a victory speech. “Change begins now … We said we would end the chaos, and we will, we said we would turn the page, and we have. Today, we start the next chapter, begin the work of change, the mission of national renewal and start to rebuild our country.”

The election result has upended British politics.

Labour won some 410 seats, an increase of 210, while the Conservatives, the western world’s most successful party, lost about 250 lawmakers, including a record number of senior ministers and former Prime Minister Liz Truss.

The Scottish National Party imploded, losing 38 seats, ending its own decade of dominance in Scotland and leaving its dream of independence for Scotland in tatters, while conversely the Irish nationalists Sinn Fein became Northern Ireland’s largest party for the first time.

Meanwhile, the populist right-wing Reform UK party, headed by Nigel Farage, the colourful Brexit campaigner and friend of Donald Trump, won more than four million votes.

While it secured only four lawmakers, its impact on the outcome by siphoning vast tracts of Conservative support will make Farage a major thorn in the side of the two major parties.

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SORRY SUNAK

A glum Sunak conceded defeat and will meet King Charles later to formally resign before Starmer is appointed in his place.

“Today power will change hands in a peaceful and orderly manner, with goodwill on all sides,” Sunak said.

“There is much to learn and reflect on and I take responsibility for the loss to the many good hardworking Conservative candidates … I am sorry.”

Despite his convincing victory, polls have suggested there is little enthusiasm for Starmer or his party.

Thanks to the quirk of Britain’s first past the post system and a low turnout, Labour’s triumph was achieved with fewer votes than it secured in 2017 and 2019 – the latter its worst result for 84 years.

The pound and British stocks and government bonds rose on Friday, but Starmer comes to power at a time when the country is facing a series of daunting challenges.

Britain’s tax burden is set to hit its highest since just after World War Two, net debt is almost equivalent to annual economic output, living standards have fallen, and public services are creaking, especially the much cherished National Health Service which has been dogged by strikes.

Some of Labour’s more ambitious plans, such as its flagship green spending pledges, have already been scaled back while Starmer has promised not to raise taxes for “working people”.

Likewise, he has promised to scrap the Conservative’s controversial policy of sending asylum seekers to Rwanda, but with migration a key electoral issue, he will be under pressure himself to find a way to stop tens of thousands of people arriving across the Channel from France on small boats.

Item 1 of 7 Keir Starmer, leader of Britain’s Labour party, reacts as he speaks at a reception to celebrate his win in the election, at Tate Modern, in London, Britain, July 5, 2024. REUTERS/Suzanne Plunkett

“I don’t promise you it will be easy,” Starmer said. “Changing a country is not like flicking a switch. It’s hard work. Patient, determined, work, and we will have to get moving immediately.”

Source: Reuters

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The BBC forecasts that Boris Johnson will return to Downing Street with a majority of 74.

The prime minister said it would give him a mandate to “get Brexit done” and take the UK out of the EU next month.

Jeremy Corbyn said Labour had a “very disappointing night” and he would not fight a future election.

Labour have lost seats across the North, Midlands and Wales in places which backed Brexit in 2016.

Speaking after he was re-elected in Uxbridge, west London, with a slightly higher majority, Prime Minister Boris Johnson said: “It does look as though this One Nation Conservative government has been given a powerful new mandate to get Brexit done.”

He added: “Above all I want to thank the people of this country for turning out to vote in a December election that we didn’t want to call but which I think has turned out to be a historic election that gives us now, in this new government, the chance to respect the democratic will of the British people to change this country for the better and to unleash the potential of the entire people of this country.”

Speaking at his election count in Islington North, where he was re-elected with a reduced majority, Mr Corbyn said Labour had put forward a “manifesto of hope” but “Brexit has so polarised debate it has overridden so much of normal political debate”.

Labour’s vote is down around 8% on the 2017 general election, with the Tories up by just over 1% and the smaller parties having a better night.

In other developments:

Jo Swinson – who only became Lib Dem leader in July and began the election campaign by saying she aimed to be prime minister – lost her Dunbartonshire East seat to the SNP by 149 votes

Nigel Dodds, the leader of the Democratic Unionist Party at Westminster, lost his Belfast North seat to Sinn Fein

The Lib Dems took Richmond Park, south-west London, from Conservative minister Zac Goldsmith

Labour’s Caroline Flint – who backed the Tory Brexit deal in defiance of her party – lost in Don Valley to Mr Johnson’s party

Labour’s longest-serving MP Dennis Skinner also lost his seat to the Conservatives

Remain-backing former Tory minister Dominic Grieve came second to the Conservative candidate in Beaconsfield

Anna Soubry, who quit the Tories to form a pro-Remain group of MPs, lost her Nottinghamshire seat to the Tories

It was also a bad night for new Lib Dem recruits, with ex-Labour MPs Chuka Umunna and Luciana Berger, and former Tory minister Sam Gyimah failing to win a seat

Scottish National Party leader and Scotland’s First Minister Nicola Sturgeon said it had been an “exceptional night” for her party.

She said Scotland had sent a “very clear message” that it did not want a Boris Johnson Conservative government and the prime minister did not have a mandate to take Scotland out of the EU.

It was also a “strong endorsement” for Scotland having a choice over its own future in an another independence referendum, she added.

Labour looks set for one of its worst election results since World War Two.

Some traditional Labour constituencies, such as Darlington, Sedgefield and Workington, in the north of England, will have a Conservative MP for the first time in decades – or in the case of Bishop Auckland and Blyth Valley – for the first time since the seat was created.

Labour took Putney, in south-west London, from the Tories, in a rare bright spot for Jeremy Corbyn’s party.

The BBC forecast suggests the Tories will get 364 MPs, Labour 203, the SNP 49, the Lib Dems 11, Plaid Cymru four, the Greens one, and the Brexit Party none.

A row has already broken out at the top of the Labour Party, with some candidates blaming Jeremy Corbyn’s unpopularity on the doorstep and others blaming the party’s policy of holding another Brexit referendum.

Leave-supporting Labour chairman Ian Lavery, who held his seat with a reduced majority, said he was “desperately disappointed”, adding that voters in Labour’s “heartlands” were “aggrieved” at the party’s Brexit stance.

Downing Street said earlier that if Mr Johnson was returned to Downing Street, there would be a minor cabinet reshuffle on Monday.

The Withdrawal Agreement Bill, paving the way for Brexit on 31 January, would have its second Commons reading on Friday, 20 December.

A major reshuffle would take place in February, after the UK has left the EU, No 10 added, with a Budget statement in March.

This is the UK’s third general election in less than five years – and the first one to take place in December in nearly 100 years.

Mr Johnson focused relentlessly on a single message, to “get Brexit done”, while Labour primarily campaigned on a promise to end austerity by increasing spending on public services and the National Health Service.

Nigel Farage said his Brexit Party had taken votes from Labour in Tory target seats, although he himself had spoiled his ballot paper “as I could not bring myself to vote Conservative”.

Source: BBC

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