Labour Party and Keir Starmer Win Landslide Victory over Rishi Sunak’s Conservatives in UK

Final counts of the ballots from yesterday’s election for a new parliament and a choice of prime minister to come with it showed the Labour Party soundly trounced Conservative Party of Rishi Sunak.

Though exact vote counts are still being completed, exit polls carried out by the three main television news broadcasters in Britain predict the center-left Labour Party will secure 410 out of the 650 total seats in the Parliament of the United Kingdom. That is well above the 326 seats required for a majority, and 279 above the 131 seats the center-right Conservative Party currently headed up by PM Rishi Sunak.

In winning such a landslide, the Labour Party will gain 209 seats from its previous count of 201. Sunak’s Tories, the slang name for the Conservatives, just saw their numbers plummet from the current 372 seat majority to a dismal 131. If one adds up all the opposition parties to the incoming majority, the Labour Party will hold a 170-seat lead when they take the floor.

It is a colossal drubbing for Rishi Sunak. Not only did his political party lose in yesterday’s balloting, Sunak also was voted out of his own seat in parliament, where he represented the Richmond-Northallerton part of the country. It is the first time an incumbent prime minister has failed to be reelected in his Member of Parliament position since 1910.

When Sunak took office on October 25, 2022, he arrived as the third prime minister to take office in the country in just three months. The country then was dealing with extremely high inflation, still “getting back to work” after oppressive government policies forced far too many to stay home from work during the pandemic, reeling from the impacts of trade sanctions against Russia which forced food and fuel prices to skyrocket, and struggles to support Ukraine militarily and financially after Russia invaded in February 2022.

Sunak was far from a widely popular choice, as indicated by the solid but not overwhelming majority his party held since that time. In hindsight, some would say he was a desperate choice, a selection the UK citizenry backed seemingly in the hope that perhaps a different kind of leader might pull the UK out of electing leaders with great hope then dumping them in a very short time. His government role as former finance minister was considered a substantial plus when he ran for office less than two years ago, coming soon after the Bank of England had to take emergency steps to prevent a “run at the bank” and possible full implosion of the UK economy while previous Prime Minister Liz Truss lead the country.

When Sunak became Prime Minister, he made history in multiple ways. At 42 years old, he was the youngest Prime Minister to lead the United Kingdom in over 200 years. He was the first British Indian to hold the position. He was also the first “person of color” in that role and the first PM of the Hindu religion.

Sunak was also arguably the wealthiest person ever to head the country. Even accounting for inflation, he and his wife’s combined net worth as of figures available in May 2022 was £730 million, equivalent to U.S. $837 million. That is more money than even Queen Elizabeth was credited with at the same time.

Though he successfully campaigned in 2022 arguing that his being rich should not be held against him, Sunak’s wealth proved to haunt him. He was increasingly accused of being “out of touch” with the average UK citizen. He also failed to introduce legislation and policies which were able to reverse the growing gaps between earnings made by the richest people in the country and those of the masses.

The average citizen is also hurting financially, and it is more than just a perception. Recent data shows individuals’ average disposable income has fallen by 0.9% since Sunak took control.

Sunak is also being held accountable for the fragile state of the nation’s social services. The famed National Health Service, for example, is perceived by many on the edge of fiscal and operational collapse.

The nation’s prison system is also reportedly ready to fall hopelessly into the red soon.

Numerous cities are also struggling to draw in enough income to remain afloat as well. Birmingham, the second largest city in the country with a population of 1.145 million, ran out of cash and declared bankruptcy on September 5, 2023, less than one year ago.  

The outgoing UK head of state is also blamed for having reversed course on a previous aggressive plan to wean the nation off the use of fossil fuels at a record pace.

For Keir Starmer, the leader of the Labour Party, the win represents a dramatic turnaround of the fates for his party. It will take control of the parliament – by that 170-seat lead – with the Tories no longer in control for the first time since 2010.

It is also a landmark achievement for Starmer, who as a lawyer and fiscal conservative helped rebuild the entire nature of what the Labour Party stands for since become a power figure for it in 2019.

He has the background of an “everyman”, who said once in an interview that, ““My mum was a nurse, my dad was a toolmaker.” He also described his youth as living with the same day-to-day sufferings of many of people living in the UK today and grew up seeing unpaid bills growing while his family had to choose between eating and keeping the home phone line operating.

Living this way taught Starmer many lessons of fiscal responsibility which people believe he will use to guide his creation of new policies on taxation, funding the fiscally emaciated social services which are a key safety net for the public, and to stimulate the economy where needed to bring it back from the brink.

In foreign policy, Starmer is expected to hold more to the positions of his predecessor, especially regarding full support for Ukraine, even more strident defenses of “Israel’s right to exist” and Netanyahu’s genocidal war against the Palestinian people, and the importance of NATO.

Operationally, he is seen as a coalition builder rather than as a revolutionary who acts on his own. While that stands as a positive compared to the autocratic nature of Sunak’s leadership, critics within his own party such as Labour’s former Director of Strategic Communications James Schneider say Starmer’s more “pragmatic” approach paints him more as “reflect[ing] the ideas of the people that are around him” rather than an innovator or dynamic leader.

Rishi Sunak is expected to submit his resignation almost immediately following declaration of the final results of yesterday’s elections.

Keith Starmer has reportedly already scheduled his first meeting with King Charles to receive official recognition as the nation’s new prime minister.