Left-of-Labour vote stagnates in Holborn and St Pancras

Good morning from Holborn and St Pancras, where Labour has held the seat. On the one hand, I very much enjoyed getting to see this by-election quite so close up: an election that you don’t have to leave your flat to cover, what’s not to love? On the other, after 60 leaflets and multiple door knockers I am quite looking forward to not coming home to a small forest of campaign material every day.

Some thoughts on the auguries for the major parties in today’s note.

Standing still

Here are the scores on the doors:

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On paper, it would appear that the Green vote in Holborn and St Pancras has tripled since the 2024 general election. The reality is more of a stagnation: in 2024, Andrew Feinstein, a leftist independent, won 20 per cent of the vote in the constituency, while the Greens got 10 per cent. During this by-election, Feinstein’s party, the Camden People’s Alliance (CPA), endorsed Zack Polanski and the Greens and campaigned actively for him. (We received four leaflets from the CPA here in King's Cross.) Essentially all* that happened here was a reconfiguration of the left-of-Labour vote from 2024.

*It is a little more complicated than that. There has been a slight change since the 2026 May local elections, when this is roughly where the parties stood across the constituency:

Labour 38 per cent

Green 29 per cent

Conservative 10 per cent

Reform UK 9 per cent

Liberal Democrats 7 per cent

Camden People’s Alliance 4 per cent

The combined Green vote has essentially stood still since then. But given that in May the Greens won councils such as Lewisham, Hackney and Walthamstow at a canter suggests that Labour’s Green problems are not yet resolved.

Although this constituency is much less favourable demographically to the Green Party than Hackney (where Polanski has a long association) or Walthamstow (where he now lives), in the minds of a lot of people in Westminster, including Greens, “London” is much of a muchness. So the by-election defeat will be covered as a major setback and add to the swirling discontent around Polanski’s leadership among some in his party.

A word also on the Conservatives and Reform. Yesterday’s is the first by-election in England since 2024 in which the Conservatives have finished ahead of Reform. This is an impressive feat, given that they faced a strong squeeze message from both Labour (which used an “it’s us or Polanski” message in some of its campaigning) and the Greens (which used an “it’s us or Labour” message in all of theirs). It is doubly impressive considering that the Reform campaign here was much stronger, both in terms of the quantity and quality of literature.

But the Conservatives also finished ahead of Reform here in May’s local elections. And the fact that Reform’s vote hasn’t collapsed suggests that, just as Labour’s Green problem has been eased but hasn’t disappeared, the Conservatives’ challenges on their right flank aren’t resolved just yet.

Now try this

I had a lovely evening at the Barbican yesterday listening to the Attacca Quartet.

Now I’m off on sabbatical for a month, but don’t worry, Inside Politics will have a host of guest writers and will, therefore, be much improved. See you all in a month’s time and have a lovely weekend, however you spend it.

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