Elections 2026 live: ‘I’m not going to walk away,’ says Starmer as Farage hails ‘historic shift in British politics’

Starmer says results 'very tough' for Labour, he takes responsibility, and party must 'reflect and respond'

Keir Starmer has said that the results for Labour have been “very tough”, that he takes responsibility, and that the party must “reflect and respond”.

Speaking at Kingsdown methodist church in Ealing, west London, he said:

The results are tough, they are very tough, and there’s no sugarcoating it.

We have lost brilliant Labour representatives across the country, these are people who put so much into their communities, so much into our party.

And that hurts, and it should hurt, and I take responsibility.

When voters send a message like this we must reflect and we must respond.

I think the vast majority of people do understand that we face huge challenges as a country.

We’ve had a series of economic shocks in recent years and there’s a very difficult international situation at present, they know that.

But they still want their lives to improve, they still want to see the change that we promised, they know the status quo is letting them down and they’re frustrated, they don’t feel the changes.

It is customary for leaders to issue statements like this after bad election losses. It may quash any claims that Starmer is in denial. But he did not say anything about how the party “must respond”. There are reports that he is planning a big speech that will address this next week.

This statement also confirms that Starmer has no intention of taking the advice of John McDonnell and others and announcing a timetable for his departure.

Keir Starmer speaking at Kingsdown methodist church in London this morning. Photograph: Leon Neal/Getty Images

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Labour concedes defeat in Wales

Bethan McKernan is the Guardian’s Wales correspondent.

Welsh Labour is not going to be able to form the next Welsh government, the party’s deputy first minister has told BBC Wales.

No seats have yet been called in Thursday’s Senedd election as counting began on Friday morning. Plaid Cymru and Reform UK have led in the polls, vying to end Labour’s dominance in Wales since devolution began in 1999.

When asked if Welsh Labour were going to be in a position to form a government with current leader Eluned Morgan as first minister, Huw Irranca-Davies replied:

I don’t think we’re going to be in that situation.

We tried to put forward a very positive manifesto.

I think it has been a good manifesto, it really has, and we have tried to argue on policies and also the next chapter for Wales.

But if it hasn’t cut through to the people of Wales, we’re not going to be in that position then to actually form the next government.

Zoë Garbett, the Green mayor of Hackney, won with 35,720 votes, beating Caroline Woodley, the Labour incumbent, who got 26,685 votes.

In a speech conceding defeat, Woodley said:

To Zoe, you’ve shown great determination and resilience, and I know you have the support of the council to continue the good work we have done as a liberal administration …

To my Labour government, you’ve got a lot of work to do, but thank you for the investment in housing.

Reform UK gains Essex from Tories

Reform UK has won control of Essex county council from the Conservatives after securing at least 40 of the 78 seats up for election.

Zoë Garbett says she was elected Green mayor of Hackney because people desperate for alternative to 'failing Labour'

Lisa O’Carroll is a senior Guardian correspondent.

The Green party’s Zoë Garbett has been elected mayor of Hackney. She won with 35,720 votes, beating the incumbent mayor, Labour’s Caroline Woodley, by almost 10,000 votes.

It is the first time the Greens have won a mayoral election since directly-elected mayors were introduced.

In her victory speech, Garbett said she won because people were desperate for an alternative to the “failing Labour government”. She said:

Today, we start the fightback. In this election, over and over, people kept telling me that they felt let down. People kept saying, ‘it’s hard for me and it’s hard for us’. Council services are failing those who need them most and people are struggling to make ends meet …

Across London and the country, people have made it clear that they are desperate for an alternative to this failing Labour government. It is not old parties versus new parties, this is about a system of fear versus a movement of hope.

Garbett also said that affording housing and reducing child poverty would be priorities.

This administration is yours because the people of Hackney own Hackney and it’s time to take it back.

That’s why one of my first acts will be to do a full investigation into who owns Hackney, its buildings, its land, to begin getting these spaces back to the communities who desperately need them.

Our plan is about getting the basics right and making day to day easier, getting repairs done quickly, making food and energy cheaper, and rooting out racism in our schools.

I’ll fight the system that views housing as a way of making money, rather than a universal right for every single person.

I’ll get more council houses from development. The people need somewhere affordable to stay.

And I won’t be silent about the government decisions that are harming Hackney residents like continued austerity. It is both heart-wrenching and outrageous that here’s something like one in two children in Hackney live in poverty.

Every day I will work to fix this. Poverty isn’t a fact, it’s a political choice, and Hackney says no.

Pound and UK bonds stronger after Starmer pledges to stay on as PM

Government bonds rallied after Keir Starmer vowed to stay on despite heavy losses for Labour in the local elections, the Press Association reports.

Yields on long-dated government bonds, also known as gilts, dropped back to two-week lows, with 30-year gilt yields down 11 basis points to 5.54% and 10-year gilts seeing an eight basis point fall to 4.88%, PA says. Gilt yields move counter to the value of the bonds, meaning their prices rise when yields fall.

Graeme Wearden has more on this on his business live blog.

It is looking as if the Green party has won the Hackney mayoralty, Lisa O’Carroll reports. The result is coming in the next few minutes.

Former Labour chair Ian Lavery says Starmer could 'kill Labour' if he does not resign

Ian Lavery, a former Labour party chair and former national campaign coordinator, has told the BBC that Keir Starmer could destroy the Labour party if he does not stand down.

In an interview with Jonny Dymond for the World at One, Lavery said Stamer could “kill the Labour party” and that “the most effective thing that he could do would be to have an organised withdrawal from his leadership of the Labour party, and hence the prime minister”.

Lavery said the election results were an “utter disaster”. He went on:

I firmly believe, and I’m among many others in the party, that the party could cease to be in the immediate future …

We cannot have stability when we’re at 16% in the polls and witnessing annihilation.

He also said that, if Starmer did not resign, he thought there would be a leadership election in the “coming weeks”.

Lavery is a leftwinger who was a prominent Jeremy Corbyn supporter and – as with John McDonnell (see 7.22am) or Maryam Eslamdoust (see 10.37am) – No 10 will be able to argue that Lavery’s views come as no great surprise.

But the language is very strong.

Labour blames 'strong mood for change' as it prepares for crushing defeat in Wales

Labour is heading for a crushing defeat in Wales after suffering disastrous local election results in England overnight, the Press Association reports. PA says:

The party has been the largest at country-wide elections in Wales for more than a century and had won the most seats in the Welsh Parliament since its creation more than two decades ago.

But after Wales went to the polls on Thursday, Labour is bracing itself for a brutal set of results in its former heartlands, with a senior figure admitting the party faced a “tough election campaign” under “difficult circumstances”.

In Wales, a Labour source indicated the party’s vote had collapsed in Blaenau Gwent Caerffili Rhymni and said it would be a “struggle” to hold on to one seat – out of a total of six – in the constituency, which includes some of its South Wales heartlands.

At the close of polls on Thursday, Huw Irranca-Davies, Welsh Labour campaign chairman and deputy first minister said: “After many years in government in Wales, and with Labour now governing across the UK, there was always going to be a strong mood for change and frustration.

“The ongoing pressures people face from the cost of living are real and hurt deeply. We take that seriously. There were many tough messages heard on the doorstep.

“And in the days ahead, we will reflect carefully and listen with humility to what voters are telling us. There will be no dodging. No deflection. Just determination to put things right.”

A Plaid Cymru source said: “From what we have so far…. It’s looking good.”

The Labour vote has “collapsed”, they added.

Badenoch brushes aside Tory loses, claiming party is 'coming back'

Kemi Badenoch has claimed that the Conservatives are “coming back”.

That is quite a hard argument to make, given that they have lost more than 170 seats, according to the BBC tally. But this is how she made the case in a speech to activists in Westminster, where the Tories gained control of the council from Labour.

What did we say? We said Conservatives are coming back and here we are [in Westminster].

Just look at some of the great results that we have had up and down. Look at Harlow. People said that Reform was going to take all 11 seats in Harlow. How many did they did? Zero. How many did we get? 11.

We have done brilliantly in Westminster. We have taken back Wandsworth. People said nobody even expected anything to happen in Wandsworth. Wandsworth is now under Conservative control.

Look at Fareham where Reform said they were going to be marching through. Conservative hold. We were told we were going to be wiped out in Bexley. What happened in Bexley? Conservative hold. And our councillors there have actually increased their majorities? The Conservatives are coming back.

Lisa O’Carroll is a senior Guardian correspondent.

The borough of Hackney in London is expected to call the mayoral result in the next hour with the incumbent Labour mayor Caroline Woodley fighting to remain in power against the Green’s Zoë Garbett.

Hackney is one of the Green’s key targets with polling sugesting they could unseat Labour at a mayoral level and see a surge in council seats potentially ending Labour power in the borough.

Zack Polanski, the Green leader, is expected here in Hackney after the speeches.

This is from the political commentator Sam Freedman on Bluesky on the results so far.

Based on the overnight results Labour are going to do at the lower end of expectations outside of London. Reform will sweep NE, W mids etc...

Their salvation might be Green underperformance vs polls in London. But we need to see some results from inner-London councils to confirm that.

This prompted this reply from Jim Waterson, who writes the London Centric Substack.

Greens in London not fighting that underperformance narrative atm, seem a bit disappointed, last week hit hard.

Waterson and Freedman collaborated on a very good guide to the electoral contest in London.

This is from Emma Volney from ITV Anglia, who interviewed a Reform UK councillor last night who accidentally said he was representing Ukip. Nigel Farage actually left Ukip some years ago and set up a new party (the Brexit party, renamed Reform UK), but many people view Reform as continuity Ukip – including, it seems, this chap.

Former PLP chair Dave Watts says Starmer should stand aside and let Burnham take over

Dave Watts, a Labour peer and who served as whip in the Commons under Tony Blair and Gordon Brown, has written an article for HuffPost UK saying that Keir Starmer should stand aside to allow Andy Burnham to replace him as Labour leader and PM. Watts, who was also chair of the PLP, says:

The leadership question must be confronted head-on and without further delay. Does Keir Starmer possess the qualities required to steer the country through these turbulent times and reconnect with a disillusioned electorate? On the evidence of Thursday’s results, the answer is no.

It’s clear we need a change, and many MPs and Labour voters are looking to the most successful and popular Labour politician, Andy Burnham, to provide that change.

I believe that Andy should be allowed to stand in a by-election to boost Labour’s prospects and to provide the leadership needed.