Sir Keir Starmer has become the UK’s first Labour prime minister since 2010 after his party’s landslide general election victory.
Labour is returning to power with a huge parliamentary majority of 174, following a collapse in support for the Conservatives. Sir Keir has been formally appointed by the King at Buckingham Palace, replacing Tory leader Rishi Sunak, and made his first speech in Downing Street.
Speaking outside No 10 Sunak vowed to remain his party’s leader until formal arrangements for selecting his successor are in place.
In a short farewell speech, he apologised to unsuccessful Tory candidates and told the public: “I have heard your anger, your disappointment.” Sir Keir is expected to begin appointing his new cabinet on Friday afternoon, before it meets for the first time on Saturday. Labour’s victory has come largely as a result of a dramatic 20 point drop in Tory support, with the party down 250 seats to 121, a historic low.
It marks a dramatic turnaround in fortunes for Sir Keir’s party, which suffered its worst result in terms of seats – 202 – at the last election in 2019 under Sir Keir’s predecessor Jeremy Corbyn.
Despite only increasing its share of the national vote by around 2%, the party has won 412 seats with just two seats yet to declare, delivering a result just short of the historic 179 majority won by Tony Blair in 1997. Its vote share increase came entirely as a result of a 17 point increase in support in Scotland, where it regained its status as the largest party as the SNP slumped from 48 to just nine seats.
On a good night for smaller parties, the Liberal Democrats won 71 seats, the party’s best result in a century, whilst Nigel Farage will become one of four MPs for Reform UK, following a breakthrough night for the fledgling party.
Sir Keir fought a cautious campaign in which Labour made very few new policy pledges, but managed to largely retain the large polling lead over the Tories it began with when outgoing Tory PM Rishi Sunak called the election in May.
BBC
