Election 2024: Education secretary Gillian Keegan loses her seat

Loss in Chichester to the Lib Dems comes amid disastrous night for the Tories

Loss in Chichester to the Lib Dems comes amid disastrous night for the Tories

Education secretary Gillian Keegan has lost her seat in Parliament.

The Liberal Democrats defeated the Conservative politician in Chichester with 25,540 votes to Keegan’s 13,368.

Keegan said it was “not the outcome we wanted, but clearly, the people have spoken across the country and here in Chichester”. 

It comes amid a disastrous night for the Tories, who the exit poll predicts will win just 131 seats, while Labour is predicted to take 410 in a landslide.

Keegan has served as education secretary since October 2022, when she was appointed to the role by prime minister Rishi Sunak. She was the tenth Conservative to hold the role since 2010, and the sixth since the last election in 2019.

Before that Keegan held the apprenticeships and skills brief as a junior minister at the Department for Education from February 2020 to September 2021.

She is among several senior Conservatives who have lost their seats, including House of Commons leader Penny Mordaunt, justice secretary Alex Chalk and defence secretary Grant Shapps.

This is a breaking news story and will be updated.

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