Jacob Rees Mogg loses seat on night time the Tory massive beasts fell

Former cabinet minister Sir Jacob Rees-Mogg was among the biggest of Tory beasts to be culled as the Labour Party returned to power after 14 years with a crushing victory.

On a humiliating night for Rishi Sunak‘s party, some of the Conservatives‘ biggest names – including a record number of Cabinet members – lost their seats as Labour stormed to a historic landslide win.

Among those to be ousted in a brutal election night bloodbath was Mr Rees-Mogg who lost his Somerset North East & Hanham seat to Labour’s Dan Norris by more than 5,000 votes.

Afterwards, he said he could not ‘blame anybody other than myself’ and that it had been ‘a very bad night for the Conservatives’.

Sir Keir Starmer boasted ‘we did it’ today after a Labour victory put him on course to be the next Prime Minister.

After an early exit poll predicted a Labour landslide, Sir Keir’s party roared to victory as senior Tory figures fell like dominoes.

Glum-looking Defence Secretary Grant Shapps suffered a ‘Portillo Moment’ as he was defeated by Labour in Welwyn Hatfield by around 3,000 votes.

A ‘Portillo’ moment is a reference to Conservative cabinet minister Michael Portillo who lost what had been regarded as a safe Tory seat in Labour’s 1997 landslide. 

In his parting shot, Mr Shapps said the Conservatives had ‘lost’ the election rather than Labour winning it – and ‘tried the patience’ of the public by being divided. 

And shortly afterwards Penny Mordaunt – another former Conservative leadership contender – missed out by a similar margin in Portsmouth North, admitting the party had ‘broken trust’ with voters.

Many more government ministers found themselves evicted from Parliament by voters, with Education Secretary Gillian Keegan losing in Chichester to the Liberal Democrats – who also took out Justice Secretary Alex Chalk.

Former Justice Secretary Sir Robert Buckland, Veterans Minister Johnny Mercer, Education Secretary Gillian Keegan, Culture Secretary Lucy Frazer, Chief Whip Simon Hart and Transport Secretary Mark Harper were all culled – as were Tory deputy chairman Jonathan Gullis, former deputy PM Therese Coffey and Michael Fabricant.

Welsh secretary David Davies, Science Minister Michelle Donelan and Attorney General Victoria Prentis were all kicked from their seats. 

Senior Tory Liam Fox, who had been the MP for North Somerset since 1992, also narrowly lost his seat to Labour. He lost by just 639 votes to Labour candidate Sadik Al-Hassan.

Mr Rees-Mogg congratulated Sir Keir Starmer on ‘what seems to be a historic victory’.

Speaking at the University of Bath after the result was declared, Sir Jacob said: ‘May I begin by giving my warmest congratulations to Dan Norris, who has been a servant of North East Somerset or Wansdyke as it then was before and I am sure will be a devoted constituency MP in the future.

‘And congratulate Sir Keir Starmer who has led his party to what seems to be a historic victory. And this is the great virtue of our democracy, so I congratulate both of them.’

Sir Jacob then thanked his agent, campaign director and constituency staff who had ‘worked so hard over the last 14 years’.

He said: ‘And one final thought, from Caractacus Potts, and that is from the ashes of disaster grow the roses of success. So thank you very much everybody, and good night.’

Ms Mordaunt admitted the Conservative Parry has taken a ‘battering’ because it failed to honour ‘the trust that people had placed in it’.

Labour’s Amanda Martin ousted the Leader of the House of Commons from Portsmouth North, winning by just 780 votes.

Ms Mordaunt, 51, would have been hotly tipped to run for the party leadership again had she managed to keep her seat.

She said: ‘Tonight, the Conservative Party has taken a battering because it failed to honour the trust that people had placed in it. You can speak all you like of security and freedom, but you can’t have either if you are afraid.

‘Afraid about the cost-of-living or accessing healthcare, or whether the responsibility you shoulder will be recognised and rewarded. That fear steals the future, and it only makes the present matter and that is why we lost.

‘Our renewal as a party and a country will not be achieved by us talking to an ever smaller slice of ourselves but being guided by the people of our country. And if we want again to be the natural party of government, then our values must be the people’s.

‘I’ve lost many good colleagues tonight but I hope that like me they intend to carry on serving their communities with even stronger heart, our country needs all of us.’

Ms Mordaunt, who had held the seat from 2010, also said she will ‘never stop caring’ for the people of Portsmouth.

It came after Mr Shapps was the first confirmed Cabinet casualty and he hit out at the Tory ‘soap opera’ which had turned off voters.

‘It’s not so much that Labour won this election but rather that the Conservatives have lost it,’ he said.

‘On door after door, voters have been dismayed by our inability to iron out our differences in private and do that and then be united in public.

‘Instead we have tried the patience of traditional Conservative voters with a propensity to create an endless political soap opera out of internal rivalries and divisions which have become increasingly indulgent and entrenched.’

He said there was a danger the Tory party could ‘go off on some tangent, condemning ourselves to years of lacklustre opposition’.

In a rare positive for the Tories, both Mr Sunak and Mr Hunt held on to their seats in Richmond and North Allerton and Godalming and Ash respectively.

But the Prime Minister conceded defeat in his victory speech and said: ‘The Labour Party has won this General Election, and I’ve called Sir Keir Starmer to congratulate him on his victory. Today, power will change hands in a peaceful and orderly manner, with goodwill on all sides.

‘That is something that should give us all confidence in our country’s stability and future.

‘The British people have delivered a sobering verdict tonight, there is much to learn… and I take responsibility for the loss. To the many good, hard-working Conservative candidates who lost tonight, despite their tireless efforts, their local records and delivery, and their dedication to their communities. I am sorry.’

Mr Sunak is expected to announce he is quitting as leader in the morning, although he would stay on until a replacement is chosen. 

Ex-home secretary Suella Braverman, at her count, said she was ‘sorry’ for the behaviour of her party and how it had abandoned core supporters’ values. 

‘I’m sorry that my party didn’t listen to you,’ she said.

‘(The) Conservative Party has let you down. You – the Great British people voted for us over 14 years and we did not keep our promises. We’ve acted as if we’re entitled to your vote regardless of what we did, regardless of what we didn’t do, despite promising time after time that we would do those things and we need to learn our lesson because if we don’t, bad as tonight has been for my party, we’ll have many worse nights to come.’

Thanking voters in her constituency, Ms Braverman said they were ‘patriotic, common sense, kindly, dedicated, enterprising’.

The Hampshire MP wrote a Telegraph article earlier this week with the headline: ‘It’s over, we have failed.’