Nigel Farage’s Reform Party snatched a parliamentary seat off the Labour Party in a by-election on Thursday.

In the Runcorn and Helsby constituency, in north-west England, Reform’s candidate, Sarah Pochin, won 12,645 votes (38.7% of the vote), only six votes ahead of Labour’s Karen Shore. In last year’s general election Labour won more than 50% of the vote, with Reform winning 18%.

No other candidate won more than ten percent of the vote.

The by-election was called after the sitting Labour MP, Mike Amesbury, was found guilty of assault, leading to his resigning the seat. Pochin is now Reform’s fifth member in Westminster.

Farage was quoted as saying: “It’s the closest by-election since the war and I think one of the most dramatic. But I sense, also, one of the most significant.”

The by-election was held in parallel with a number of local government polls, which also saw Reform do well. Preliminary results from various local councils showed Reform gaining a number of councillors. It secured its first mayoralty, with its candidate being elected the mayor of the Greater Lincolnshire council.

[Image: By Gage Skidmore from Peoria, AZ, United States of America – Nigel Farage, CC BY-SA 2.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=75602028]


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