Labour has won the Holborn and St Pancras byelection in a high-stakes battle for the left of British politics.
The byelection, called after the former prime minister Keir Starmer resigned the seat in September, was considered a two-horse race between the Labour candidate, Sagal Abdi-Wali, and the Green party leader, Zack Polanski. Abdi-Wali recieved ۱۲,۲۹۲ votes to Polanski’s ۸,۹۲۸.
Turnout was ۳۸.۷%, the lowest for any byelection held in England during this parliament and ۱۵.۴% down from ۲۰۲۴.
The Greens conceded defeat shortly before the result was announced, with a party spokesperson saying “taking the fight to Labour in one of its safest seats shows just how far the Greens have come.”
Labour’s victory will be a relief for Andy Burnham in his first big electoral test as prime minister, and reinforces polling that shows he has recovered some public support lost by Starmer, his predecessor in Downing Street.
While Starmer won a ۱۱,۵۷۲ majority in the constituency for Labour at the ۲۰۲۴ general election, victory in the byelection was not guaranteed. Andrew Feinstein, a leftwing independent, came second in ۲۰۲۴, and the Greens peeled off some Camden council seats from Labour in May’s local elections.
Abdi-Wali, the leader of Camden council, is a former child refugee who came to the UK from Somalia in the ۱۹۹۰s.
Reform UK’s home affairs spokesperson, Zia Yusuf, was accused by Labour of “straightforward racism” after he said she was being “foisted” on voters in the constituency and suggested she was not British.
The Greens ran a strong ground game, dispatching thousands of members to knock on doors in the constituency, even before Polanski was selected as the party’s candidate.
Polanski’s loss caps a bruising week for his eco-populist party, which fell into turmoil after it voted on Sunday to adopt a policy declaring Zionism as a form of racism. The motion passed in a vote by Green members at the party conference despite opposition from four of its five MPs.
The motion said Zionism – the movement for a Jewish state – should be “treated as any other form of racism” and called for Israel to be replaced by a single Palestinian state. The head of the Jewish Greens condemned the motion and said she may leave the party, although it was supported by some Jewish Greens.
Even members who supported large parts of the motion were unhappy about its narrow conception of Zionism which some fear could brand those in favour of the idea of a Jewish homeland, but not specifically the modern-day state of Israel, as racist.
Polanski missed the debate on the motion and did not cast a vote, which left some members frustrated over his lack of leadership on the matter. Shortly after polls closed, Caroline Lucas refused to say whether Polanski should stand down. Speaking to BBC Newsnight, the former Green leader said: “I want him to show the leadership that was frankly missing on Sunday,” when the motion was voted on. Polanski was campaigning in the constituency instead.
The Greens’ standing in the polls, and Polanski’s personal approval ratings, had already fallen in recent months, after a peak in popularity last summer, exemplified by the Greens’ seismic win in the Gorton and Denton byelection in February.
Midway into the race, George Galloway, running in “self-exile” out of outside the UK, put his name on the ballot in a move that many Green supporters warnedsaid could pull votes away from Polanski. He received ۳۱۴ votes.
