Keir Starmer Becomes UK PM as Conservatives Suffer Record Defeat in Huge Labour Landslide
**ABC News**
**Keir Starmer Becomes UK PM as Conservatives Suffer Record Defeat in Huge Labour Landslide**
*It is being described as an "electoral apocalypse."*
*By Patrick Reevell*
*July 5, 2024, 3:07 PM*
**1:41**
*UK Conservative Party Defeated in a Landslide: Exit Poll*
According to the UK’s official exit poll, the governing Conservatives have faced a crushing defeat in the recent election clickhear---
**LONDON** -- A change election in the United Kingdom has taken place as the center-left Labour Party won a huge landslide, putting a crushing end to the 14-year rule of the Conservative Party, which suffered a record devastating defeat — perhaps the worst in its history.
Voters have inflicted a historic wipeout on the Tory party that led Britain through Brexit and, with almost all results called, Labour has won over 400 seats, gaining a huge majority of more than 190, comparable to Tony Blair’s sweeping victory in 1997. The Tories, meanwhile, have lost hundreds of seats, on track for the worst result since the party’s founding in the 1830s.
Labour’s Keir Starmer became Prime Minister Friday morning after Rishi Sunak resigned in front of King Charles III. Starmer met with the King immediately after to ask for permission to form a government, a formality that was granted by the reigning monarch clickhear
*Justin Tallis/AFP via Getty Images*
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Starmer is now the first Labour leader to win an election since Tony Blair clickhear----
The result is notable as a win for centrist progressives amid the far-right populist surge in the U.S. and many other major Western countries. The British electorate voted overwhelmingly to sweep out the Tories, expressing their anger at the crumbling state of Britain’s public services and years of political chaos following Brexit.
Starmer only became the Labour leader in 2019 and has dragged his party back to the center ground, wrestling it away from the influence of Bernie Sanders-like left-wing former leader Jeremy Corbyn.
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*Toby Melville/Reuters*
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Starmer ran on a platform to “end the chaos” and to begin slowly reinvigorating Britain’s services and infrastructure. He has also promised to move away from culture war debates, including Brexit, saying the UK will not rejoin in his lifetime.
The Tories, meanwhile, are now enduring what one of its leading figures described last night as an “electoral apocalypse.”clickhear
Many of the party’s best-known figures lost their seats on Thursday, including a record number of cabinet ministers. Former Prime Minister Liz Truss was unceremoniously swept aside, as well as a lead campaigner of Brexit, Jacob Rees-Mogg.
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Outgoing Prime Minister Rishi Sunak held his own seat but led a weak campaign after choosing to call the snap election six weeks ago, making repeated gaffes — most damagingly returning home early from D-Day commemorations to do a TV interview. Sunak, the last of five consecutive Conservative prime ministers since 2016, lasted just 18 months in the job.
Labour has a number of challenges ahead as they attempt to govern the country. The Tories suffered such a massive defeat partly due to the rise of a far-right anti-immigrant populist party, Reform, led by Brexiteer-in-chief Nigel Farage. Farage, who finally was elected to Parliament, took huge chunks of the Tory vote clickhear
Also concerning for Labour, despite their enormous majority, the party won a record-low proportion of the total popular vote, only around 35%. This suggests that despite a strong desire for change and to give Labour a chance, there is little overall enthusiasm for Starmer.
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Starmer now faces the challenge of meeting the potential of his huge majority. Unlike when Blair came to power, the UK is facing a far more difficult economic outlook and ominous state finances, making fixing Britain’s struggling public services daunting clickhear--
Starmer has acknowledged this, saying throughout the campaign — and following his victory — that improvement will be slow and hard at first. He has promised to hit the ground running, pledging to cut short Parliament’s summer recess to start work on his agenda. Labour says they will focus immediately on issues like housing, as well as confronting an urgent crisis of overcrowding in prisons.
The more modest promises reflect the more difficult realities Britain faces, but also mark a change in tone from right-wing populist forces rising elsewhere across Europe clickhear
