Labour has won the Blackpool South by-election after a huge swing from the Tories amid mounting losses for Rishi Sunak’s party in local elections across the country.

The Conservatives avoided finishing in third place to Reform UK by just 117 votes, and have so far lost more than half of their council seats up for election.

The by-election in Blackpool South was held after The Times revealed that Scott Benton, the former MP, had offered to lobby ministers in exchange for money. It marks the eleventh by-election defeat for the Conservatives since the last general election.

We’re probably looking at certainly one of the worst, if not the worst, Conservative performance in local government elections for the last 40 years,” he told the BBC.

The by-election in Blackpool South was the third biggest swing in post-war by-election history, and the fifth parliamentary by-election with swings of more than 20 per cent from Tories to Labour.

Curtice said: “The last time we had swings that big was the 1992 to 1997 parliament, and we know what happened in 1997.

“Of course the Conservatives were defending a very high baseline, losses did seem inevitable. But so far, they are basically losing half of the seats they’re trying to defend. If that continues, they may end up losing 500 or so seats which was the thing they were meant to avoid.

https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/local-elections-results-2024-live-tory-labour-latest-news-h7zd09wdt

Nobody cares about British local politics and elections in Nigeria; America is now in charge. We anticipate the next POTUS.

So does it remove them from office?

you won't even know they are doing elections in uk