Labour’s deputy leader didn’t concede the election, but she got as close as possiblepublished at 03:29 GMT
Jack Fenwick
Political correspondent
Lucy Powell: Clear the Greens were able to turn out their vote more strongly than we have
Lucy Powell didn’t concede this by-election, but she got
about as close as possible without doing so.
That felt like the biggest turning point of the night.
The ability of the three parties to get out their vote –
to make sure their supporters turned up at the ballot box – was always going to
be key.
Labour’s deputy leader said the Greens did a better job
of that.
There were hints about where the debate within the Labour
Party may now go.
Lucy Powell was the only member of Labour’s ruling
National Executive Committee to vote for Andy Burnham to be allowed to stand
here.
She wouldn’t go as far to say that Keir Starmer’s
decision to block him was the reason Labour lost.
But she did say that it was a different conversation for
a different day. I suspect that day may come sooner rather than later.
She also said that she’d argued that Labour couldn’t
out-Reform Reform.
That’s a clear hint that she – and others – will likely
call for Keir Starmer to move the party to the left – to go after the voters
they’re losing to the Greens, instead of the voters they’re losing to Reform.
There’s a big caveat to all this – we haven’t had the
result yet.
But nobody here is now claiming that it’s too close to
call.
