“The British people have chosen change,” Bridget Phillipson has declared, after the exit poll predicted a Labour election landslide.
The shadow education secretary’s Houghton and Sunderland South seat was the first to declare its result after today’s election. She won comfortably with over 18,000 votes, but Reform UK beat the Conservatives into third place with more than 11,000.
A government powered by hope. By the belief that tomorrow could not just be different from today, but better
The national exit poll – commissioned by the major broadcasters – has estimated Sir Keir Starmer’s party has won a 170-seat majority.
If it is borne out in the formal results, that would leave Labour with 410 seats, the Conservatives with 131, the Liberal Democrats with 61, Reform with 13 and the Greens with two.
In her victory speech in the north east, Phillipson said “if the exit poll this evening is again a guide to the results across our country as it so often is, then after 14 years the British people have chosen change.
“They have chosen Labour and they have chosen the leadership of Keir Starmer. Today our country, with its proud history, has chosen a brighter future. The British people have decided that they believe, as Labour believes, that our best days lie ahead of us.
“Hope and unity, not decline and division. Stability over chaos. A government powered by hope. By the belief that tomorrow could not just be different from today, but better. A government of service.
“A government with purpose – above all to change our society for good. A government determined to build a Britain where background is no barrier, no matter who your parents are or where you were born.
“Determined to tear down the barriers to opportunity, which hold back too many of our children. That is Labour’s purpose.”
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