Mason Boycott-Owen explains the Selby by-election: Labour win majority in the North Yorkshire seat

Yorkshire Post

Mason Boycott-Owen, The Yorkshire Post's Westminster Correspondent, explains the results of the Selby by-election and what it means for Labour and the Conservatives.

Transcript

00:00 So it's been a historic night for Labour in Selby today, where the candidate

00:06 Kieran Mayfair overturned a 20,000 Tory majority to win the seat from the

00:10 Conservatives. He's not only won a 4,000 majority of his own to defend at the

00:15 next general election, but he's now the youngest MP in the House of Commons at

00:19 25 years old. This seat should really not be one that the Tories are losing. It's

00:25 always been blue since it was created in 2010, but we've not only seen the biggest

00:31 Labour by-election win since the Second World War, but also a very worrying night

00:35 for Rishi Sunak. North Yorkshire, it's a Tory stronghold and has always kind of

00:41 expected to be even at the next general election. This may put some doubts in

00:44 that. There have been a number of reasons behind the loss. Firstly, the

00:48 circumstances behind the resignation of Nigel Adams, the Tory MP who resigned. He

00:54 in what Tory MP described as throwing his toys out of the pram moment, stepped

01:02 down after he was denied a peerage of part of Boris Johnson's resignation

01:06 honours list. Nigel Adams has been a big Boris Johnson supporter over the years

01:10 and there was a sense that he was going to be rewarded for this in the

01:15 resignation honours list, yet he was kept off it. He was due to step down at the

01:19 next general election anyway, but this seemingly self-motivated nature of his

01:25 recognition has gone down very badly with many residents up in the seat. In

01:30 terms of policy, it's all about the cost of living. There are a lot of homeowners

01:34 and well-off people in North Yorkshire and the crisis of affordability is

01:38 hitting them as well, especially around things such as the cost of mortgages and

01:42 even things such as energy prices. And for the Conservatives, as soon as the

01:46 cost of living crisis starts hitting those who are slightly more

01:49 well-off, perhaps slightly more middle-class, then they're really going

01:53 to be in trouble because that is, at the end of the day, a big part of their voter

01:56 base, particularly in the north. It really can't be overestimated how good a result

02:01 this is for Labour. It was never really a realistic target seat, even when this

02:06 by-election was called, and even at the next general election where it is

02:10 looking a more favourable seat to win because of the boundary changes, it was

02:14 still not high up on their list of priorities. However, this result does give

02:19 a bit of food for thought for Labour in terms of where it goes with its

02:23 Green policies. Labour's unexpected loss or lack of gaining the Tory seat up in

02:29 Uxbridge means that the party needs to look maybe with a bit more of

02:35 a critical eye at the Green policies it has because when it comes down to what

02:40 voters want, if you put the options before them in a cost of living crisis

02:46 especially, is it a question of what you can afford or do you want more

02:51 climate change policies? A lot of people are going to be more concerned about

02:55 their pockets than they are about the planet at this moment in time.

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