Live Commentary
12:23pm Tuesday Starmer has announced he will resign as Labour leader and PM once a new leader is chosen. Streeting won’t contest the Labour leadership. Nominations for the leadership open on July 9 and close a week later. Unless someone other than Burnham can win 81 signatures from Labour MPs, Burnham will become the next UK PM on July 16 or 17.
9:55am With 99.9% counted in today’s Colombian presidential runoff election, populist right-winger Espriella defeated left-winger Cepeda by 49.65-48.70, with the remaining votes invalid. The margin of under 1% for Espriella was less than polls predicted (4-8 point Espriella margins in polls taken after the first round result).
9:39am Monday According to media reports, Starmer is expected to set out a timetable for his resignation tonight AEST. This will probably allow Burnham to become Labour leader and PM without a contest. Wes Streeting would also like to be Labour leader, but can he get the 81 required signatures?
4:22pm A by-election for Greater Manchester Mayor will be required by August 6 after the mayoralty became vacant following Burnham’s win.
4:07pm To challenge for the Labour leadership, a candidate needs at least 20% of Labour MPs (81 Labour MPs in the current UK parliament). They need MPs to sign a petition, so supporters of a challenger can’t remain anonymous. The incumbent leader doesn’t need to meet this threshold. A membership ballot is then held by post, with the winner decided by preferential voting.
12:15pm Burnham (Labour) CRUSHES Reform in Makerfield by 20.3 points, far more than what any poll said. He got 54.8% of the vote, a clear majority.
11:23am The Tory who won Aberdeen South was elected to the Scottish Parliament on May 7, and will need to resign his seat there. But there won’t be a by-election as he was a list MP. His seat will be taken by the next Tory on the list.
11:19am The BBC says Labour is unofficially claiming victory in Makerfield with 54% of the vote.
11:02am The SNP have easily HELD Arbroath and Broughty Ferry. Labour was a close second in 2024, but their vote has collapsed.
10:57am The Tories have GAINED Aberdeen South from the SNP. Unionist supporters consolidated behind the Tories, who were narrowly third in 2024, as Labour’s vote collapsed.
10:44am The BBC says senior Labour MP Louise Haigh has said she is “quietly confident” that Labour has won the Makerfield by-election.
10:33am The BBC says Labour people are more optimistic about Makerfield.
10:10am Turnout in Makerfield was 58.8%, up 6.3% from the turnout in this seat at the 2024 general election. It’s very unusual for turnout to be higher at a by-election than the general.
9:50am The BBC live blog says that, according to party sources, the Tories are likely to gain Aberdeen South from the SNP at one of today’s by-elections.
9:45am Friday While we wait for the UK by-election results, there’s been more counting in the California 14 special election that occurred Tuesday. With 95% counted, Dems Wahab (with 42.8%) and Hernandez (with 16.8%) advance to the August 18 runoff. Overall, Dems beat Reps by 51.1 points, a 15.7-point swing to the Dems on margin compared with the 2024 presidential results in that seat.
Guest post by Adrian Beaumont, who joins us from time to time to provide commentary on elections internationally. Adrian is a paid election analyst for The Conversation. His work for The Conversation can be found here.
Polls close at 7am AEST Friday for a UK parliamentary by-election in Makerfield. This by-election was caused by the May 14 resignation of Labour MP Josh Simons to allow Greater Manchester Mayor Andy Burnham to run. If Burnham becomes an MP, he is expected to challenge Keir Starmer for the Labour leadership.
At the 2024 general election, Labour defeated the populist right Reform in Makerfield by 45.2-31.8 with 10.9% for the Conservatives, 6.8% Liberal Democrats and 4.4% Greens. But at the May local elections, Reform won 50% in the eight wards within Makerfield.
Four recent Makerfield polls have Burnham leading Reform by 5-12 points, with Restore (another populist right party) on 5-8%. In the Election Maps UK aggregate of national polls, Reform leads with 27.4%, followed by Labour at 19.5%, the Conservatives 18.6%, the Greens 13.0%, the Lib Dems 12.3% and Restore 2.8%. The Greens have slid from a high of 15.9% in late March.
There will be two other parliamentary by-elections today, both caused by the resignation of Scottish National Party MPs after their elections to the Scottish parliament on May 7. In 2024, the SNP won Aberdeen South by 32.8-24.7 over Labour with 24.4% Conservatives, 6.9% Reform, 6.3% Lib Dems and 3.5% Greens. The SNP won Arbroath and Broughty Ferry by 35.3-33.4 over Labour with 15.5% Conservatives, 8.6% Reform and 5.1% Lib Dems.
US: further California results
In near-final results from the June 2 California jungle primary, Democrat Becerra (with 28.1%) and Republican Hilton (with 24.7%) advanced to the November gubernatorial election, with Democrat Steyer missing out with 22.8%. For Los Angeles mayor, incumbent Bass (with 34.3%) and left-wing challenger Raman (with 29.0%) advanced, with right-wing challenger Pratt missing with 25.5%.
At the concurrent federal special election for California 1, Republican Gallagher won 62.1%, avoiding a runoff by winning a majority. Republicans overall defeated Democrats by 27.5 points, a small swing to them from Donald Trump’s 24.9-point margin in this seat over Kamala Harris in 2024.
At Tuesday’s jungle primary federal special election for California 14, with 82% counted, Democrat Wahab has 42.4%, Democrat Hernandez 16.7% and Democrat Singh 13.2%. An August 18 runoff between Wahab and Hernandez will be needed. Overall, Democrats defeated Republicans by 75.1-24.3, a 50.8-point margin. This seat voted for Harris over Trump in 2024 by 65.8-30.4, a 35.4-point margin.
Denmark, Slovenia, Peru and Colombia electoral events
At the March 26 Danish election, the left-wing Red bloc of parties won 86 of the 179 seats and the right-wing Blue bloc 78 seats. With both blocs short of the 90 needed for a majority, the Moderates with 14 seats were the kingmakers. On June 2, a minority government was formed that included the Social Democrats (38 seats), the Green Left (20), the Moderates and the Social Liberals (ten). This was a hold for the Social Democrats.
At the March 22 Slovenian election, the liberal GS won 29 of the 90 seats, the right-wing SDS 28, the Christian NSi nine, the centre-left SD six, the conservative Democrats six, the left-wing Levica five and the anti-vaxxer Resni.ca five. A right-wing government led by the SDS was sworn in on May 22, with right-wing parties winning overall by 48 seats to 40. This was a gain for SDS from GS.
At the June 7 Peruvian presidential runoff election, right-winger Fujimori leads left-winger Sánchez by 50.1-49.9 with 99.4% counted. A Fujimori win would be her first win after three consecutive runoff losses. In the April first round, there was a fragmented field, with Fujimori getting 17.2% and Sánchez 12.04%, just ahead of the populist right Aliaga on 11.91%.
Legislative elections also occurred in April using proportional representation with a 5% threshold. Out of 60 senators, right-wing parties won by 30-23 over left-wing parties with seven for a centrist party. In the Chamber of Deputies, the right and left tied with 56 seats each out of 130 with 18 for centrists.
Incumbent left-wing Colombian President Petro was ineligible to run for a second term. At the May 31 first round election, the populist right Espriella won 43.7% and the left-wing Cepeda 40.9%. The runoff is on Sunday (Monday AEST). Polls have Espriella leading by 4-8 points.
Thank bloody god.
Starmer ran the UK Labour Party into the ground – he stood for nothing and was completely craven.
He was elected because people had had a gutful of the status quo – and at every possible turn his response was “the status quo, but worse”. At one stage he wound up to the right of Farage on welfare policy, and then when he belatedly realised what a problem that was, suddenly started declaring that a position he had expelled his own MPs for voting for a couple of years prior was in fact going to be his crowning achievement.
And that’s not even getting into his blundering with Epstein’s buddy Mandelson because the noxious idiot he clung to as chief of staff told him to do it. Or losing a safe working-class seat to the Greens because he thought he was so smart in trying to keep Burnham out of parliament.
The man made Albo look like bloody Whitlam. He was Albo if Albo had absolutely no underlying principles or political sense.
I’m pretty hopeful Burnham can turn things around and save UK Labour from annihilation, and in turn hopefully be a blow to the far-right globally. I haven’t been so excited about an election result in years. To the extent his positions are now are similar, it’s only because Starmer yanked the Overton window so far to the right in so little time.
@nadia
As the clear winner of the Makerfield by-election, Andy Burnham will be sworn back into the House of Commons next week.
From there it’s less clear. Only HoC MP’s can serve as Prime Minister, so he can’t make any moves until then.
The ball’s now in Keir Starmer’s court. He can either bow out with dignity and voluntarily resign his position for a clean transition of leadership to Burnham, he can dig in and make it a fight that would drag on for the next two months, or he resigns and someone like Wes Streeting throws a wrench in the gears and makes it a fully contested challenge for the next two months anyway.
All three options would probably eventually lead to Andy Burnham meeting King Charles to become the next Prime Minister by September.
Streeting is a nonentity in the leadership contest.
The Australian equivalent would be if Albo were being leadership-stalked by Don Farrell.
Even those who hate Starmer’s guts hate Streeting more.
@Rebecca
True, but if Wes Streeting contests the Labour leadership election, party rules have to go by the book and if he gets enough support, he’d stand as a candidate and the whole shebang will have to be played out.
Thanks Kirs. Hopefully Streeting doesn’t start mudding the waters as a 3rd candidate.
We’ll see what Starmer (Paddington) does. I’m guessing he’ll put up a fight so this might drag on until Sept, like you say. May result in a short term poll hit for Labour, but hopefully Burnham can turn the ship around.
@ Rebecca – yes the shenannigans in February where Starmer tried to keep Burnham out of Parliament and the end result was the loss of a seat to the greens reflected poorly on Starmers handling of the situation.
If Streeting wants to humiliate himself, so be it. He’s got to find enough MPs to even be able to stand first. I can’t say I’d mind if he burned a few more bridges with Burnham supporters along the way.
Starmer fell apart so quickly that Burnham will still have the better part of three years to make his mark either way.
@Nadia, I think the Australian equivalent of Burnham potentially replacing Starmer would be Peter Malinauskas being the alternative Labor PM of Albanese.
Malinauskas to Burnham is an especially weird comparison to make after this week’s absolutely surreal SA abortion vote, that saw Malinauskas, his Treasurer, the Liberal leader, a random Liberal and random Labor backbencher, and all four members of One Nation line up to vote against abortion rights and literally everyone else vote for them.
Malinauskas is more Streeting if Streeting had a likeable personality, political sense, and views on at least some issues that were in the Labor mainstream.
Kirsdarke, Friday, June 19, 2026 at 2:39 pm:
Kirsdarke – I have no worries on that score. Just to double check, I asked Google Gemini AI:
Q: Can you please find me the most recent 5 things Andy Burnham has publicly said about Ukraine, Russia, Zelenskyy or Putin?
A:
On top of that, Burnham is very much on board with former Defence Secretary John Healey on the UK getting its spending in defence up to 3% of GDP by 2030, as opposed to the PM and Treasurer’s insistence on the 2.68% of GDP by 2030 in the DIP. This is more in line with someone who wants the UK to be there for Ukraine, in my book.
Streeting is going to get the tap on the shoulder that if he stands and blocks Burnham he’s going to get kicked to the backbench and replaced next election. Supposedly they’ve had internal polling showing Streeting is hated almost as much as Starmer.
Crazy that the UK has managed to have a significantly worse set of Prime Ministers than Australia did with Gillard/Abbott/Turnbull/Morrison. They have nuclear weapons.
Hopefully Burnham will provide some actual unity and policy platform (and messaging). Which will kill off the creepy weirdo boob hypnotist and the UK will have seen peak Greens with Burnham winning the next general easily.
Major of Greater Manchester sounds like an ideal job for a Green
Peter at 4:17 pm
————
David, why are you now going by Peter?
I’d put this on the main thread, but it bears on discussion here as well. A neat summary of the various timeframes which might be involved in Andy Burnham’s path to Number 10:
“How quickly could Andy Burnham become the UK’s prime minister?:
After winning the Makerfield byelection, the returning Labour MP faces a number of scenarios in his bid to replace Keir Starmer”
https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2026/jun/17/how-quickly-could-andy-burnham-become-the-uks-prime-minister
https://www.theguardian.com/politics/live/2026/jun/18/makerfield-byelection-keir-starmer-andy-burnham-robert-kenyon-labour-leadership-reform-aberdeen-arbroath-uk-politics-latest-news-updates
Well, guess it’s going to go the hard way then.
He’s seen how successful Jacinta Allen’s leadership is and is determined to match her refusal to step down.
While Starmer has indicated that he’ll stand in the leadership contest, he needs to recognise that he doesn’t have the numbers to stay in No. 10. If he bows out without
further ado, Burnham might offer him a prominent Cabinet position, such as the Foreign Secretary, provided Cooper makes way for him. If, however, he digs in, his reputation will be in tatters. It’s in his hands; let’s hope he takes wise counsel.
Wes Streeting is an odd duck for being Labour MP – Deeply Christian and homosexual. I don’t think either of those are total barriers to leadership but combined might be a bridge too far. Plus the kicker is that in some opinion polls he was only political who had worse approval ratings that Starmer – Probably because he had until recently been in charge of the NHS.
Wow Labour crushes Reform who got 34.5% of the vote. U know Labour won the 2024 general election in a landslide with 33.7% of the vote.
They won by over 20%. That’s crushing. 33.7% is good when nobody else is getting that high, its not good when someone else is on 54%. Is that that hard to understand?
Israel is desperate to destroy Trumps Iran peace plan and will no doubt resort to an Israeli “false flag” attack on US bases that will be attributed to Iran.
Looking through history, it is possible for a UK government to change leaders and still be successful. Anthony Eden won a comfortable majority at the 1955 election and resigned in 1957 after the Suez crisis. Harold Macmillan then took over and won a bigger majority for the Conservatives at the 1959 election.
While true they lost the next one in 1964 after Macmillan himself resigned and was replaced by Alec Douglas-Home, Labour under Harold Wilson barely squeaked over the line with 317/630 seats.
More recently Boris Johnson took over from Theresa May and had a stonking victory in 2019.
Interesting game going on between Burnham & Starmer.
I’m guessing Burnham wants Starmer to go quickly and quietly and that negotiotions are afoot, but it looks like Starmer will dig in. ie: Force Burnham to have blood all over his hands.
I don’t like where this one is heading.
I suppose, looking at history, PM’s are usually blasted out by one of two methods…
1. Deposed by the party, or
2. Deposed by the electorate.
There is a 3rd method too, but usually only reserved for Australian PM’s, and rarely used.
3. Drowning at a beach in Victoria.
Arky says:
Friday, June 19, 2026 at 11:38 pm
Wow Labour crushes Reform who got 34.5% of the vote. U know Labour won the 2024 general election in a landslide with 33.7% of the vote.
——-
They won by over 20%. That’s crushing. 33.7% is good when nobody else is getting that high, its not good when someone else is on 54%. Is that that hard to understand?
===============
It’s a good result for Burnham alongside a good swing. I’d be interested to see some hypothetical UK polls with Burnham as leader, as it appears Labour voters are drawn back to Labour with someone like him in charge.
I’m getting intrigued by the delay.
Will be interesting to see also the election result for his Mayor’s position.
Won’t be ideal if it’s a Reform pick up.
It’s important for Burnham and his supporters to move quickly. There’s no time to lose as he will need every available moment to establish himself as leader in the public consciousness in the lead up to the next election. Even in the best-case scenario of a smooth transition in the next couple of days, things will be tight with an election mandated within a mere… *checks notes* …hold on. Three Years? Three frickin’ years! That’s an entire Australian electoral cycle!
So, anyway, as I was about to say… ahem…
It’s important for Burnham and his supporters to not move too hastily. This is an important transition which will shape U.K. politics for years to come, so it’s worth taking the time to get it right. Whether it’s to be a fight or a smooth handover, the important thing is that it’s seen to be valid and not rushed for reasons of expediency. After all, there’s heaps of time.
The Sloan Zone on the subject.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=usb3lHy4bU0
It will interesting to see how Starmer goes.
Going kicking and screaming is not dignified but is always an option. And it is looking more likely than not. Starmer has never been good at reading the tea leaves.
Alternatively, he could do a deal with Burnham and take a role like Foreign Secretary or Attorney General which would suit his skill set.
Ante Meridian, Saturday, June 20, 2026 at 5:02 pm:
—————————
On The Rest Is Politics, they’re suggesting the transition from Starmer to Burnham at Number 10 will most likely be completed by the time of the UK Labour Conference in late September this year.
There’s good deaths, and there are bad deaths.
Starmer is going to have to pick.
“Alternatively, he could do a deal with Burnham”
Burnham should want him as far away as possible. Out of the Parliament if possible.
Starmer has accepted reality. “Timeline for his resignation” will be set on Monday.
It’s one of the many ironies in this that I don’t think Starmer would have crashed this quickly had he allowed Burnham to stand in Gorton and Denton.
He wasn’t under nearly the same pressure at the time and while Burnham would’ve been a rival, he wouldn’t have been remotely leader in waiting.
The Gorton and Denton shemozzle created the Makerfield situation, and Burnham’s thumping victory on the back of Starmer’s loss in the area at the local elections killed Starmer’s prime ministership dead.
Restore Britain won at 7% meaning it probably did take around 1/6 of the Reform Voters. Of course, the key difference is that One Nation is more extreme than Reform but less extreme than Restore meaning ONP political leanings would be somewhere in between Reform and Restore.
I’ll be interested to see how the Mancunian Messiah goes as PM.
To my way of thinking, he stands for less than Starmer does. He’s notorious for shifting his position on issues in line with public thinking. He’s basically all about the vibe.
He’ll get a terrific honeymoon and then we’ll see what we see.
The whole “beliefs” things is a bit over-blown in my view – most of the more successful politicians tend to have a pretty malleable belief set, with perhaps a few high profile totemic issues that help to define them. Indeed, those politicians that are too rigid in their positions tend to get run over by reality. As for Burnham, he is indeed reasonably flexible overall, within the broader ideological settings of the British Labour Party, but as mayor he championed improving homelessness and public transport, and he’s on record as being a supporting of voting reform. He also ran on economic management and general competence. That will probably be enough for him to map out a political persona, especially as he quite presents as a fairly likeable personality.
You’d be very hard-pressed to find a politician who stands for less or who easily shifts position as Starmer. He stands for absolutely nothing except a deep-seated hatred of the UK Labour left.
It’s telling that the one thing I’ve read his supporters describe fearing being ditched with Burnham is, not any specific item of policy, but his hostility to Labour’s left.
There’s a fine line between being an opportunistic weathervane who stands for nothing and being able to effectively adapt and shift with the times in order to best represent ones’ constituents. I don’t really know enough about Burnham to have any idea of whether he’s the former or the latter, but he surely can’t be any worse than Starmer was in that regard.
If he can advocate a consistent platform that appeals to the electorate once he becomes PM, generally sticking to his guns while avoiding being too stubbornly obstinate, his previous vacillations should hopefully remain a distant memory for most voters. Ultimately, he’s going to be judged by how he performs as PM rather than on various statements he may have made years ago.
Sounds like a deal has been made. We shall see within the next 24 hours…. although the details might not come out.
I do think Starmer in the Foreign office makes a lot of sense. He seems to do alright in that area compared to the rest of domestic policy and Burnham is less interested in that space too.
Well, this certainly was a very, very consequential by-election:
https://www.theguardian.com/politics/live/2026/jun/22/keir-starmer-resignation-timeable-andy-burnham-labour-leadership-prime-minister-latest-news-updates#top-of-blog
Within 84 hours of polls closing, UK Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer has announced he’s resigned.
And Starmer’s gone – potentially within a couple of weeks, too, if Streeting can’t get the numbers to nominate against Burnham.
This is one of the most positive things to have happened in Western world politics in years.
I have to wonder, are we living in a period of electoral instability in western democracies, where the voting populaces (populi?) are being driven to frustration by economic circumstances but also egged on by the social media mafia to have no satisfaction in their leaders and not giving time for things to happen/work? As such, how many governments are actually going to be able to serve full or multiple terms and actually be productive instead of just constantly reactive?
In this regard, Albo has bucked the trend by winning the 2025 election but the polling in Australia is now well and truly in that toilet as well.
The reason I ask, is because if Burnham is no Carney (or Mamdani) then the UK is going to back in the same position in six months.
Well said to everything Rebecca.
Streeting is a monster and shouldn’t be allowed near the office of the PM. Fortunately most Labour voters know this, and know how he has ruthlessly accelerated the privatisation of the NHS, and probably won’t give him the chance. He still has his fans like Owen Jones but after Mandelson I think he’s finished, he just may not have realised it yet.
JM from Qld: Too much of the Western political mainstream still thinks they’re in the 1990s. Blairist politics is death at a time when people are incredibly angry with the status quo – running on the basis that you basically believe in the status quo and so you won’t scare the horses at a time when people want to burn the status quo down is a suicide note of a strategy.
You’re not going to get multiple terms to figure out if you feel like doing anything in government or if it’s all a bit hard, especially when the opposition is the far right and not the centre-right who don’t pretend to have any answers either.