Alex, you've been monitoring the seats
and how all that has been unfolding for us.
Good morning, Tom. Yeah, well, it makes it very easy to
monitor when the map behind me here, the Bloomberg live tracker is updating in
real time now. 90% of constituencies declared.
And when you're thinking about the majority, why these little dots matter?
What we are looking at is a realignment in British politics.
We are seeing Labour demolish the Conservatives with the help, it's worth
saying, of Nigel Farage's right wing Reform Party.
Nigel Farage wasn't even going to stand in this election at the beginning, but
his party coming second. In fact, chopping down the Conservative
vote in many seats, which led to the Tories in many cases losing their
overall majority in those seats. Now why does this matter?
Why does any of this matter? This is a huge change.
Remember 2019, Boris Johnson got an 80 seat majority Get Brexit done.
The Conservatives seem poised for maybe ten years, people were saying, and
governments in five, they have collapsed currently.
Well, you can see here 99 they're currently below 100 seats while Labour
charge ahead on 390. And look at that, the rise of the
others, the other parties. Here you're seeing reform.
Nigel Farage's new party picking up four seats.
They may not be winning a huge number of seats, but as I say, taking a huge chunk
of the share in many seats the Conservatives would have been defending
or eyeing. You've also got the collapse in Scotland
of the Scottish National Party. Now, of course, they've been the
dominant force north of the border. They swept Labour aside.
They've been pushing for a second Scottish independence referendum.
Now they're below ten and the re-emergence of the Liberal Democrats as
the third political force in Britain, they've got more than five times the
number of MEPs they got in 2019. There's a sense then, Tom, that yes,
Labour's victory is a mile wide, but in many cases an inch deep.
As people are expressing frustration with the Conservatives, a lot of support
going to independent candidates and also new parties like reform.
So Keir Starmer is celebrating this big win and it is a big win, but there is a
sense that Labour are going to have to win over a very cynical electorate, even
with that kind of majority.