forecast throughout the programme. good morning. it s friday, the zistjuly. our main story. the conservatives have suffered two huge by election defeats overnight, losing somerton and frome to the liberal democrats, and selby and ainsty to labour. there was one positive for rishi sunak and his party as they held on to uxbridge and south ruislip by the slimmest of margins. our political correspondent alex forsyth has the story of the night. i hereby declare that kier mather is duly elected. cheering the jubilation was obvious. in the early hours of this morning, this was the moment labour overturned a conservative majority of more than 20,000 to win in selby and ainsty, something the party has never done before. the people of selby and ainsty have sent a clear message. for too long, conservatives up here and in westminster have failed us. and, today, that changes.
i hereby declare that kier mather is duly elected. cheering the jubilation was obvious. in the early hours of this morning, this was the moment labour overturned a conservative majority of more than 20,000 to win in selby and ainsty, something the party has never done before. the people of selby and ainsty have sent a clear message. for too long, conservatives up here and in westminster have failed us. and, today, that changes. it s time for a fresh start. earlier, the lib dems were celebrating in somerton and frome. another huge victory for them in a seat that had been conservative. their candidate saying it showed her party was back in the west country. lifelong conservative voters have today voted liberal democrat for the first time. thank you for putting your trust in me to deliver for you. i will not let you down.
Previously the baby of the House, Sara Britcliffe was elected to serve Hyndburn in Lancashire aged just 24 in 2019. Kier Mather has now replaced her as the youngest MP.
that. you could argue that this result today shows that he is doing something right, but also, of course, something that he will have to watch out for is making sure he does keep that labour base who might want a labour government for the very reason that they think they will spend a bit more on public services. thank you very much indeed, david wallace lockhart, who is our political correspondent, of course, they are in selby and ainsty. and what was i saying earlier, professor john curtis refer to what he said there, the steady as they go policy is the ming vase policy of keir starmer s, and one has to congratulate kier mather, the new mp for that area, described overnight in one programme as an inbetweener.
i hereby declare that kier mather is duly elected. cheering the jubilation was obvious. in the early hours of this morning, this was the moment labour overturned a conservative majority of more than 20,000 to win in selby and ainsty, something the party has never done before. the people of selby and ainsty have sent a clear message. for too long, conservatives up here and in westminster have failed us. and, today, that changes. it s time for a fresh start. earlier, the lib dems were celebrating in somerton and frome. another huge victory for them in a seat that had been conservative. their candidate saying it showed her party was back in the west country. lifelong conservative voters have today voted liberal democrat for the first time. thank you for putting your trust in me to deliver for you. i will not let you down. but look at this, in the west london seat of uxbridge in south ruislip, it went down to the wire. votes had to be re counted before it was announced the conservatives ha