Labour Party ends 14 years of conservative rule as Keir Starmer becomes Prime Minister
The Labour Party has won a landslide victory in the UK general election, sweeping hundreds of seats across the country and ending 14 years of Conservative rule.
Keir Starmer is set to be appointed prime minister later on Friday, ending an era which has seen five different Conservative leaders running the country.
Rishi Sunak, the outgoing PM, conceded at around 04:40 in the morning, acknowledging Labour had won and saying that he had called Sir Keir to congratulate him.
In his victory speech minutes later, the Labour leader promised “national renewal” and vowed that he would put “country first, party second”.
“We have earned the mandate to relight the fire,” he told jubilant Labour activists in London. “Our task is nothing less than renewing the ideas that hold this country together.”
“The electoral mountain that Labour has needed to climb is bigger than Tony Blair had to climb and he (Starmer) has climbed it with room to spare,” Peter Sloman, a professor of politics at the University of Cambridge, told Reuters.
The result marks a stunning reversal from the 2019 election when Labour, led by the veteran left-wing politician Jeremy Corbyn, suffered its worst electoral defeat in almost a century.
On the other side, Robert Buckland, a former Conservative minister who lost his seat, described it as “electoral Armageddon” for the Tories.
It is expected to be the party’s worst result in almost 200 years, with a battle over the future direction of the party likely to commence in the coming days.
However, Keir Starmer will inherit the war in Ukraine as one of the key foreign policy issues for the U.K.
His predecessor, Rishi Sunak, became a strong ally to President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, visiting Kyiv several times and supplying Ukraine with military aid even as new U.S. aid was held up in Congress. The U.K. was the first country to provide lethal aid to Ukraine and also the first to send advanced systems like Western tanks.
Zelenskyy welcomed Starmer’s victory this morning, vowing that Ukraine and the United Kingdom have been and will continue to be “reliable allies through thick and thin.”
Congratulations are already coming in for Starmer, who is set to succeed Sunak as prime minister after a decisive win by his Labour Party.
Israel President Isaac Herzog thanked Sunak “for standing with the Israeli people” during Israel’s war with Hamas and said he looked forward to working with Starmer “to bring our hostages home” from the Gaza Strip.
Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau also congratulated Starmer on a “historic” victory. “Lots of work ahead to build a more progressive, fair future for people on both sides of the Atlantic,” he posted on X.
With the election result increasingly clear, Prime Minister-elect Keir Starmer must travel to Buckingham Palace to be formally appointed by King Charles III, a ceremonial ritual in Britain’s constitutional democracy. It will be the king’s first post-election appointment, but he has some way to go before he equals the 15 prime ministers who served under his mother, the late Queen Elizabeth II.
The new prime minister then travels to Downing Street, which will have been swiftly vacated by his predecessor. There he will address the nation outside its famous black door, then be applauded inside by civil servants. Then come the security briefings — including on protocols in case of nuclear attack — calls to world leaders, and finally the small matter of running the country.
Sourced from bbc and nbc news.
However, Keir Starmer will inherit the war in Ukraine as one of the key foreign policy issues for the U.K.
His predecessor, Rishi Sunak, became a strong ally to President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, visiting Kyiv several times and supplying Ukraine with military aid even as new U.S. aid was held up in Congress. The U.K. was the first country to provide lethal aid to Ukraine and also the first to send advanced systems like Western tanks.
Zelenskyy welcomed Starmer’s victory this morning, vowing that Ukraine and the United Kingdom have been and will continue to be “reliable allies through thick and thin.”
Congratulations are already coming in for Starmer, who is set to succeed Sunak as prime minister after a decisive win by his Labour Party.
Israel President Isaac Herzog thanked Sunak “for standing with the Israeli people” during Israel’s war with Hamas and said he looked forward to working with Starmer “to bring our hostages home” from the Gaza Strip.
Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau also congratulated Starmer on a “historic” victory. “Lots of work ahead to build a more progressive, fair future for people on both sides of the Atlantic,” he posted on X.
With the election result increasingly clear, Prime Minister-elect Keir Starmer must travel to Buckingham Palace to be formally appointed by King Charles III, a ceremonial ritual in Britain’s constitutional democracy. It will be the king’s first post-election appointment, but he has some way to go before he equals the 15 prime ministers who served under his mother, the late Queen Elizabeth II.
The new prime minister then travels to Downing Street, which will have been swiftly vacated by his predecessor. There he will address the nation outside its famous black door, then be applauded inside by civil servants. Then come the security briefings — including on protocols in case of nuclear attack — calls to world leaders, and finally the small matter of running the country.
Sourced from bbc and nbc news.
