The government has lost two key by-elections in a double blow to Boris Johnson’s premiership.
Labour was hotly tipped to take Wakefield from the Conservatives, with polling suggesting it would easily reclaim the former “Red Wall” seat. It won with 47.9% of the vote, while the Conservatives slipped to 30%.
But it was in Tiverton & Honiton in the South West that the most troubling defeat occurred. The Conservatives and the Liberal Democrats were thought to be neck-and-neck, with recent polls suggesting the Lib Dems could narrowly win the seat and overturn the Conservatives’ 24,000-vote majority. As it turned out, the Liberal Democrat candidate won 52%, with the Conservatives taking 38.5%. The area has been held by the Conservatives for more than a century.
As well as acting as a verdict on the “partygate” scandal, the defeats are being seen as a report card for the government’s flagship levelling up policy, which is failing to cut through to Red Wall voters.
And in the former Blue Wall Tory heartlands, voters appear to have been put off by the PM’s increasingly populist policies, despite voting overwhelmingly for Brexit.
Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer said the Wakefield win showed the country “has lost confidence in the Tories”, adding: “This result is a clear judgment on a Conservative Party that has run out of energy and ideas.”
Oliver Dowden has quit as Conservative Party chair, saying: “We cannot carry on with business as usual. Somebody must take responsibility.”
