London mayor Sadiq Khan's win for Labour is a bright spot after grim drubbing
09 May, 2021
Labour’s Sadiq Khan has kept his position as mayor of London after a day of elections that saw his party colleagues beaten across England.
In London, he could brush aside Conservative applicant Shaun Bailey after second preference votes were counted.
Mr Khan had 1,206,034 votes, or 55.2 % of the vote, and Mr Bailey had 977,601 votes, or 44.8 per cent.
Britain's ruling Conservative Party made great gains across England as Labour lost a lot more than 200 council seats.
Mr Johnson's party alos drastically won the Westminster by-election in the northern England town of Hartlepool, breaking the Labour Party’s decades-long stronghold on the seat.
Across the country its success continued since it won a lot more than 1,500 English council seats.
In London, Mr Khan could keep carefully the Conservative tide from washing over him.
“I’m proud to have won an overwhelming mandate today,” Mr Khan said after the result was announced. But London is “deeply divided" with the scars of Brexit “yet to heal” and “economic inequality” getting worse, he added.
"We must utilize this moment of national recovery to heal those divisions. Coronavirus doesn't care if you're a Brexiteer, a Remainer or woke," said Mr Khan.
Despite recent criticism surrounding Mr Johnson's handling of the coronavirus pandemic, his party strengthened its grip on working-class areas, and analysts said that success will secure the Conservatives' position in the coming years.
The increased loss of the Hartlepool seat was a significant blow to Labour Party leader Sir Keir Starmer, who faced his first electoral test since promising to transform the party after its heavy general election defeat in 2019.
By Saturday, Labour had lost a lot more than 200 council seats.
England's first Muslim MP, Labour's Khalid Mahmood, who last month stood down from the party’s front bench, is standing by Mr Starmer.
He told The National he blamed the party’s “London-based bourgeoisie” for it “losing touch”.
"What we have to do is look at the reality of what the people we is there to represent is, and this is the real people employed in the communities, who don't home based, who actually physically venture out to work, in industry, cafes or driving buses, who continue steadily to struggle,” he told The National.
Source: www.thenationalnews.com
TAG(s):