Tories lose two key byelections on same night in
Wakefield and Tiverton and Honiton
Labour takes Wakefield and Lib Dems snatch Tiverton
and Honiton, piling pressure on Boris Johnson
@peterwalker99
Fri 24 Jun
2022 04.15 BST
Boris
Johnson has faced a double hammer blow to his authority after the Conservatives
lost two key byelections on the same night, with Labour taking Wakefield and
the Liberal Democrats overturning a 24,000-plus majority to snatch Tiverton and
Honiton.
The
Tiverton and Honiton result, where the Lib Dem candidate, Richard Foord,
defeated the Tories’ Helen Hurford by 6,144 votes to take a constituency that
has been Conservative in its various forms for well over a century, is believed
to be the biggest numerical majority ever overturned in a byelection.
A Labour
win in Wakefield was more expected given Labour had consistently held the seat
before the 2019 election, but the 4,925 majority for Simon Lightwood against
the Conservatives’ Nadeem Ahmed is a major boost for Keir Starmer in the battle
to regain “red wall” seats.
Johnson is
in Rwanda for the Commonwealth heads of government summit, before travelling to
the G7 and Nato summits in Germany and Spain, keeping him out of the country
for the next week. But in his absence, the double loss could push Tory
backbenchers to try to restart efforts to oust him.
Foord said
his victory should send a clear signal to the Conservatives.
“The people
of Tiverton and Honiton have spoken for Britain. They have sent a loud and
clear message that it’ time for Boris Johnson to go.”
“Communities
like ours are on our knees. Everyone standing on this stage has felt the pain
people are suffering as the costs of living crisis starts to bite. Yet when
Boris Johnson could be fighting for farmers, for our NHS and for rural services
he will be fighting once again to save his own political skin.”
Ed Davey,
the Lib Dem leader, said the Tiverton and Honiton result meant it was time for
Tory MPs to “finally do the right thing” and oust the prime minister.
He said:
“This should be a wake-up call for all those Conservative MPs propping up Boris
Johnson. They cannot afford to ignore this result.”
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.”
Earlier
this month, Johnson won a confidence vote called by Tory MPs after
controversies over lockdown-breaking Downing Street parties, with 148 MPs
seeking to remove Johnson and with 211 supporting him.
Under party
rules he is officially safe from a similar challenge for a year. However, these
rules can be changed.
The results
arrived within less than ten minutes of each other, at either side of 4am.
First came Wakefield, where Lightwood won easily, securing 13,166 votes,
against 8,241 for Ahmed, a swing to Labour of just over 8%.
In Tiverton
and Honiton, Foord oversaw a massive 30% swing to the Lib Dems, taking 22,537
votes against 16,393 for Hurford.
The Tory
candidate, who had endured a sometimes tricky campaign, locked herself in a
room set aside for media interviews at the West Yorkshire count, reportedly
refusing to speak to the press.
In his
victory speech, Foord thanked voters in the Devon constituency, including
Labour supporters who, he said, had “lent” their backing to help him win.
The scale
of tactical voting, which saw Labour gain 1,562 votes in Tiverton and Honiton,
while the Lib Dem candidate in Wakefield got just 508, will further alarm
Conservative officials and MPs.
The
byelections were called after the respective MPs resigned in disgrace. Imran
Ahmad Khan stepped down in Wakefield having been convicted of sexually
assaulting a teenage boy, while Neil Parish quit in Tiverton and Honiton after
watching pornography in the Commons.
The result
is another landmark for the Lib Dems, who took the similarly rural,
Brexit-minded Tory seat of North Shropshire in a byelection in December,
overturning a Tory majority of nearly 23,000 to win after the former MP Owen
Paterson quit over a lobbying scandal.
This
followed a win for the Lib Dems in June last year in Chesham and Amersham, a
commuter-belt constituency to the north-west of London, prompting worries among
Tory MPs that dozens of similar “blue wall” seats could fall amid widespread
dislike of Johnson among more liberal-minded Conservative voters.
A sense
that Johnson is no longer an electoral asset, coupled with the parties, could
result in Tory MPs turning decisively against the prime minister, although a
new challenge is viewed as unlikely before autumn.
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