REPORTER’S NOTEBOOK
Pro-Palestinian independent candidates and Farage’s far-right party win four seats each, while Labor wins a landslide victory.
“At least it’s not the conservatives,” says my neighbor as she protects herself from the rain with an umbrella.
That is the feeling among many in the UK on Friday, following the Labor Party’s landslide election victory, or perhaps more accurately, the Conservatives’ crushing defeat.
Experts say voter turnout could be the lowest in more than 20 years – a sign that many have given up on the political system.
The economy is struggling, the National Health Service is overwhelmed and scandal-hit conservatives have diminished trust in politicians.
They oversaw Brexit after a referendum campaign that deeply divided society and during which a Labor MP, Jo Cox, was fatally shot and stabbed. They lost support for their handling of the COVID-19 pandemic when several Conservatives, including then-Prime Minister Boris Johnson, broke the lockdown rules imposed on the nation.
And during the election campaign, outgoing Prime Minister Rishi Sunak upset many when he skipped an international commemoration of the 80th anniversary of the Normandy landings, known as D-Day, for a television interview. To top it off, figures from the Conservative Party are suspected of betting on the date of the general elections.
Many of those who chose the Labor Party in Thursday’s election voted for its simple slogan of “change” and not for the center-left Labor leader, Keir Starmer, a 61-year-old former lawyer with just 10 years of political experience.
Jonathan Tonge, professor of politics at the University of Liverpool, presciently predicted an “apathetic slide” earlier this week.
While the outcome may be clear, the future political landscape is far from predictable.
Shortly after the results of an exit poll were announced on Thursday night after voting had finished, Rory Stewart, a former Conservative minister, said on Channel 4 that Britain is entering an era of political more radical.
Reform UK, the far-right start-up, won four seats.
All parties campaigned for six weeks, but the Reform momentum moved at breakneck speed after populist firebrand Nigel Farage announced his candidacy just a month ago – a surprise turnaround given he had previously said he would not would apply. After seven failed attempts to become an MP, he finally heads to the UK Parliament to represent Clacton-on-Sea.
The Green Party also secured four seats – a symmetry that did not go unnoticed by commentators.
“The Greens won four seats. Reform also won four seats. However, one party had 90% more mainstream media coverage than the other. Ask yourself why,” Evolve Politics, a left-leaning British news and current affairs website, posted on X.
Four was also a key number for Labor. It lost four seats to independent candidates who ran on a pro-Palestinian ticket. Other independent candidates came close.
“This is for the people of Gaza,” said Shockat Adam, the newly elected MP for Leicester South, after being announced as the winner.
He unseated Labor’s Jonathan Ashworth by just 979 votes.
British-Palestinian candidate Leanne Mohamed ended up losing in Ilford North by the slimmest of margins – 528 votes – to the Labor Party’s Wes Streeting.
Andrew Feinstein, an anti-Zionist Jew and former South African politician who was trying to oust Starmer from his London seat of Holborn and St Pancras, also made a difference. He came second behind Starmer, whose majority vote since 2019 has fallen by 17 percent.
Starmer’s priority will be to stabilize the economy. He will also be keen to restore confidence in the political system and show the public that Labor is a united party for all.
“At least it’s not the conservatives” is the mantra for now. In the coming months, Starmer may fear that people will say, “Better the devil you know.”
This story originally appeared on Aljazeera.com read the full story
