The UK Labour party is predicted to win a landslide victory in the British general election, according to a preliminary exit poll released as voting closed on Thursday evening.

According to the poll, Labour will win 410 out of the 650 seats, up from 205, in the House of Commons, while the previously governing Tories will secure 131 seats, down from 344.

• The Liberal Democrats are predicted to win 61 seats, Nigel Farage’s Reform UK 13, and the Scottish National Party (SNP) ten.
• The Greens are slated to win two seats and the Welsh party Plaid Cymru four.
• Sky News has described the Tories’ result as “the biggest electoral collapse in British electoral history.”

Official results will be announced later in the evening and throughout the night.

The 2024 election exit poll interviewed voters at 133 polling stations selected by the Ipsos agency, and is paid for by several British media companies, including Sky and the state broadcaster BBC.

The Labour landslide appears to be motivated by resentment for the Tories, who have governed as the majority since 2015, and less by confidence in the party leader Keir Starmer.

• “It is more disgust at the Tories than delight at what Labour offers that is driving politics,” Ben Page, the head of the polling agency Ipsos, told the Guardian. “Starmer’s personal ratings are the lowest Ipsos has ever seen for an opposition leader who is so far ahead in the overall voting intention.”

Fewer voters think that Labour is fit to govern, has a good team of leaders, or understands the UK’s problems than they did in 2014, according to Ipsos.

Source: RT

British PM concedes ‘sobering’ defeat

Rishi Sunak has survived the vote, but Tories suffered a historic loss

British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak has apologized to his Conservative colleagues who lost their seats, taking full responsibility for the crushing defeat his party had suffered in a snap election on Thursday.

• “The Labour Party has won this general election… the British people have delivered a sobering verdict tonight,” Sunak said in a brief speech lasting less than two minutes on Friday morning, as exit polls and early results projected the opposition to gain over 400 out of the 650 seats in the Parliament.

Sunak refused to answer questions, but indicated that he would not step down as an MP, promising his North Yorkshire constituents to continue to “serve as your member of parliament,” spending more time with them in the “week, months and years to come.”

Source: RT