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Rishi Sunak’s Conservatives narrowly held Uxbridge and South Ruislip in an unexpected by-election result in Britain’s parliament, but were poised to lose two more seats in a night of political drama.
The ruling Sunak party held the London seat vacated by former prime minister Boris Johnson by less than 500 votes, but the result, which came just before 3am, removed a ‘3-0’ threat in the prime minister’s by-election.
But within minutes, the Conservatives lost the southwest seat of Somerton and Fromm to the centrist Liberal Democrats, who turned a Tory majority of nearly 20,000 into a Liberal majority of more than 10,000.
The Conservative Party’s victory in Uxbridge has been attributed to concern over the planned extension of the ‘Ultra Low Emissions Zone’, a charge on dirty vehicles, to the outer boroughs of London planned by Labor Mayor Sadiq Khan.
Steve Tuckwell, the winning Conservative candidate, said, “Sadiq Khan has lost Labor in this election, and we know it is the devastating and costly ULEZ policy that has lost them in this election.”
The Conservatives polled 13,965 to the opposition Labor Party’s 13,470, a majority of the Conservatives’ 495. The result would be a huge relief for Sunak, who was poised to lose three parliamentary by-elections in a single day in what would have been a major blow to the ruling Conservatives.
Sunak’s party is second to the opposition Labor Party by 20 points in opinion polls, suffering from high inflation, failing public services and the recent chaos of prime ministerships in Johnson and Liz Truss.
Few expected the Tories to hold Uxbridge and South Ruislip. The competition was sparked by Johnson’s resignation after it emerged he had lied to MPs about parties held in Downing Street during the Covid-19 lockdowns.
Labor, which hopes to return to power at next year’s election, was optimistic it would win the Yorkshire seat of Selby and Ainstey from the Conservative Party, which it won in 2019 by a margin of 20,137.
The Lib Dem’s victory on Friday morning at Somerton and Frome gave Sir Ed Davey’s party a vital foothold in the Tory strongholds of the English West Country.
In that seat in Somerset, the Democrats’ Sarah Dyke won 21,187 votes, easily beating the Conservatives’ 10,179. A former Tory MP, David Warburton, had to resign in a drugs scandal.
The triple defeats in the by-election would have been the first such humiliation for a British prime minister since 1968 when Labor’s Harold Wilson lost three contests in one day.
Despite Oxbridge’s narrow victory, which came after a recount, some Conservative MPs believe defeats at Selby and Somerset would presage disastrous defeat in next year’s general election.
Sunak insists he can still turn things around and secure a fifth successive election victory, preventing Labor from gaining power for the first time since Gordon Brown was ousted from Number 10 Downing Street in 2010.
In a message to Conservative MPs on Wednesday night, the prime minister tried to boost his party’s morale, pointing to the sharp drop in inflation this week as a sign that a wave of bad economic news could turn.
Jonathan Goulis, the Tory MP, said: “He’s been telling us all to unite behind him when we come back in the autumn. We need to be one team. A united party wins, a divided party loses.”
Uxbridge is the kind of suburban seat the Conservatives need to hold on to if they want to keep their grip on power, but Selby is usually seen as a rural Tory stronghold.
Meanwhile, the Liberal Democrats see the victory over Somerton and Frome as a sign of their return to the Western country, which is overwhelmingly represented by Tory MPs.
Sunak has vowed to return in the fall, and to offer a “long-term vision” for the country. The autumn financial statement and the King’s Speech legislative package will be defining moments for the prime minister.