Chester by-election result: Labour ‘decisively’ win seat in ‘strong message to Conservative Party’

Labour have “decisively” won the Chester by-election, Rishi Sunak’s first electoral test as prime minister.

Samantha Dixon retained the seat for Labour with an increased majority of 10,974 votes, the results in the small hours of Friday morning showed.

The by-election was triggered by the resignation of Labour MP Christian Matheson in October after he was accused of sexual misconduct.

Ms Dixon defeated Conservative candidate and NHS nurse Liz Wardlaw.

She described the result as “really, really encouraging” for the party and referred to City of Chester as a “bellwether constituency”.

“I think I have been in receipt of a very strong message from the voters of Chester that they want the Conservative cost-of-living crisis tackled immediately,” she told reporters.

“I don’t think they believe that the Conservatives have the answers, I think they think it’s Labour’s turn now.”

In her victory speech, Ms Dixon said: “People in Chester and across our country are really worried. Worried about losing their homes because they can’t afford the mortgage repayments or the rent, worried about whether they can put the heating on, worried about whether they can put food on the table for their families.”

She continued: “This is the cost of 12 years of Conservative government. The government, which has wreaked havoc with our economy, destroyed our public services and betrayed the people who put their trust in them at the last general election.”

Alison McGovern, the shadow work and pensions minister, told reporters that the “people of Chester have sent a clear message to Rishi Sunak’s Conservative government: They are fed up of Tory rule and want the change Labour offers.”

She added: “Sam will be an excellent MP for Chester and a strong voice for Chester residents in the Conservative cost-of-living crisis.”

On Thursday morning, Keir Starmer had tweeted that “Sam will be a fantastic representative of her community, and as their MP would do the people of Chester proud”.

Election officials said that the voter turnout was 41.2 per cent (or 28,541 votes), a sizeable drop on the 71.7 per cent turnout (54,560 votes) in the 2019 general election.

Andy Carter, Conservative MP for Warrington South, downplayed the importance of the Chester result saying: “This is a seat that has gone to Labour six times over the last seven elections. I’m not expecting that to change.”

He was quoted as saying by the Telegraph that “we are mid-term in what has been an incredibly challenging parliamentary term on the back of Covid, a war in Ukraine where prices have shot up”.

“And you know, what I think is really, really critical now for this government is to ensure we deliver on the manifesto that we were elected on in 2019,” he said. “That’s our focus and I’m quite certain that’s the prime minister’s focus.”