UK election: Labour Party’s Keir Starmer to become next PM

The Labour Party has officially won enough seats in the UK’s 2024 general election to have a majority in parliament, as vote counting continues.

Labour Leader Keir Starmer will become prime minister and can form a majority government.

Keir Starmer led Britain’s Labour Party to a landslide election victory, and will become prime minister.

Read also: Labour set for UK general election landslide victory – exit poll

Rishi Sunak, the incumbent Prime Minister has conceded defeat after an historic thumping for his Conservative Party.

The Labour party added 199 seats to get a total majority of 401. The Conservatives lost 257 seats to retain only 108. Reform UK maintained its 4 seats, Lib Dem now has 66 seats, SNP 7 while others have 28 seats combined and 36 seats were not declared.

Starmer is the first leader from the center-left party to win a U.K. national election since Tony Blair, who won three in a row starting in 1997.

Read also: Peter Obi canvasses support for UK’s Labour Party ahead of Thursday’s election

As of the time of filing this report, a lot of the biggest names in Conservative party had lost their seat, including Jacob Rees-Mogg and former leadership contender Penny Mordaunt. Sunak and his finance minister Jeremy Hunt retained their seats.

Exit polls forecast that Sunak’s party would win only 131 seats, the worst electoral performance in its history, as voters punished them for a cost-of-living crisis, and years of instability and in-fighting which has seen five different prime ministers since the Brexit vote of 2016.