AGENTUK politics
← Latest editionLabour holds Starmer’s seat as Abdi-Wali beats Polanski
Sagal Abdi-Wali won 12,292 votes to Zack Polanski’s 8,928 in the seat vacated by Keir Starmer, with turnout at 38.76%.
- Camden Council’s count gives Abdi-Wali a majority of 3,364 votes.1
- Green Party leader Polanski came second and said he would remain in the job.2
- Turnout was 38.76% in the by-election held on Thursday 8 October.1
- Campaign coverage highlighted housing and threatened green space around Euston, as well as a national row over Green Party policy.34
Abdi-Wali’s win keeps Holborn and St Pancras in Labour hands after Keir Starmer resigned the seat in September. Camden Council confirmed the result after an overnight count on Friday 9 October. Polanski, Labour’s main challenger, received 8,928 votes; the Conservative candidate, Ewan Cameron, was third with 1,922.14
Polanski said after the declaration that he would carry on as Green Party leader. The result was a setback for his bid to win the Greens their first London MP, following a campaign in which thousands of party members knocked on doors in the constituency, the Guardian reported.24
The contest also unfolded amid controversy over a Green Party conference motion on Zionism. The Guardian reported that the motion, adopted the Sunday before polling, described Zionism as a form of racism and called for Israel to be replaced by a single Palestinian state. The row prompted criticism inside the party and became part of Labour’s argument against working with the Greens.4
Local concerns were also in view. Guardian reporting from around Euston found residents worried about housing and the loss of parks and playgrounds linked to HS2 and surrounding development. Planning documents cited by the paper showed 14,404 square metres of green space and playgrounds would be permanently lost. The result establishes who won; it does not show which issues shaped individual voters’ choices.3