BREAKING: Gorton and Denton by-election end result as Keir Starmer suffers main upset to Greens

Keir Starmer has suffered a loss to the Green Party at the Gorton and Denton by-election.

In a major upset for the Prime Minister, Labour slipped into third place after haemorrhaging votes to the Greens and Reform UK.

Zack Polanski’s party overturned a 13,413 majority won by Labour at the 2024 general election, while Nigel Farage’s right-wing outfit also overtook it.

Green candidate Hannah Spencer won the vote with 14,980 votes. She defeated Labour’s Angeliki Stogia, who gained 9,364 votes, and Reform’s Matt Goodwin, who came second with 10,578 votes. The victory marks the Greens’ first-ever parliamentary by-election victory.

Dropping into third place behind the Greens and Reform marks a seismic moment for Labour. Serious questions over Mr Starmer’s leadership are likely to erupt once again after the party lost votes to both the right and to the left.

Labour chair Anna Turley admitted the result was “clearly disappointing” and hit out at “easy answers” offered by both the Green Party and Reform UK.

In her winners speech, Ms Spencer said Gorton and Denton is a “diverse constituency” where “we fight for each other”. She referenced an incident this week at a Manchester mosque in which a man allegedly walked in carrying weapons including a knife and axe and called out “politicians and divisive figures” who blame communities for all the problems in society.

Ms Spencer, 34, who is a plumber, jokingly apologised to her customers – as she said she’ll now be needed in Parliament.

After her victory was announced, Labour’s Ms Turley said: “This result is clearly disappointing. By-elections are normally difficult for the party of government, and this election was no different. We have had thousands of conversations over the last few weeks and we know the majority of voters here did not want the poisonous politics of Nigel Farage and Reform.

“We will continue to deliver a programme for government that tackles the cost of living crisis families are facing, creates opportunities for young people and invests in our public services. The politics of anger and easy answers offered by the Greens and Reform won’t deliver this.”

During the night, after a Greens win seemed likely, Labour Deputy leader Lucy Powell said her party has to give a clearer account of itself. She said: “People want to hear very loudly and clearly what our story is and whose side we are on, and that is something we will be doing more loudly in the coming weeks.

“It’s our job to convince people that we are doing the right things for the country and that we are improving their lives, and that is the job.”

Elsewhere during the night, a row erupted over claims of family voting. Family voting is an illegal practice where two voters either confer, collude or direct each other on voting and can involve husbands telling their wives how to vote.

Democracy Volunteers – an election observer group – said they had seen “concerningly high levels of family voting” in the battle. Officials said no such issues had been reported throughout the day and questioned why the group had not raised the serious allegations throughout the day.

The by-election was called last month after former Government minister Andrew Gwynne announced he was stepping down. Greater Manchester Mayor Andy Burnham attempted to become the Labour candidate, but was blocked from doing so. Instead local councillor Ms Stogia was picked to contest the seat for Labour.

Tensions ran high throughout the campaign with Reform and the Greens throwing everything at it to pull off an upset for Labour. Political mud-slinging and accusations of misleading claims ran rife.

Labour branded Mr Goodwin “poisonous” and seized on far-right campaigner Tommy Robinson’s endorsement as a sign of his divisive politics. Labour also sought to draw a dividing line with the Green Party, honing in on its policy to legalise drugs.

The Greens say a health approach rather than a criminal justice approach should be applied to drugs. But Labour spinners claimed their plans would turn playgrounds into “crack dens”.