The Labour party has won the Tamworth by-election, overturning a Conservative majority of over 19,000 votes. Sarah Edwards, the new Labour MP for Tamworth, won by a margin of 1,316 votes with a 35.95% turnout. Edwards claimed that the people of Tamworth had “voted for Labour’s positive vision” and sent a clear message to Rishi Sunak and the government that it was “time for change”.
The by-election was held due to the resignation of MP Chris Pincher, who quit after losing an appeal against a proposed Commons suspension for drunkenly groping two men. The swing from the Conservatives to Labour was 23.9%, the second-highest ever by-election swing to Labour. Political commentator Sir John Curtice said no government had lost a seat as safe as Tamworth.
The Conservative candidate, Andrew Cooper, immediately left the room after the result was declared. A Conservative spokesman said that it had been a “difficult result on much-reduced turnout”. However, Edwards claimed that the low turnout had not led to her winning by default, because Conservatives had stayed at home and the low turnout demonstrated Conservative voters have voted Labour.
Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer described the win as “a phenomenal result that shows Labour is back in the service of working people and redrawing the political map”. Edwards said her win was a “historic victory” in Tamworth and that cost of living, policing and the health service had been the big issues on the doorstep. She offered a new vision for Tamworth and claimed that people have seen that Labour are offering a positive vision, that they want a fresh start and they are not seeing that the Conservatives have anything to offer.
The seat has existed in its current form since 1997. It was held from 1997 to 2010 by Labour Party, and since 2010 by Pincher for the Tories. The turnout of just 35.95% was lower than those seen in the 2023 by-elections in Uxbridge, Selby and Ainsty and Somerton and Frome
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