2024 United Kingdom general election: Difference between revisions

2024 United Kingdom general election
	All 650 seats in the House of Commons; 326 seats needed for a majority
Rishi Sunak; Conservative

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The 2024 United Kingdom general election is scheduled to be held on Thursday 4 July 2024.^[1] It will determine the composition of the House of Commons, which determines the Government of the United Kingdom. Significant constituency boundary changes will be in effect, the first such changes since before the 2010 general election. In addition, it will be the first UK general election where physical forms of voter identification will be a legal requirement to vote at a polling station in Great Britain.^[d]

The election will be the first since Brexit, the UK's departure from the European Union, which took place on 31 January 2020.

Background

The results of the 2019 general election are given below, alongside the current numbers in the House of Commons. Seat counts have changed through 23 by-elections and a number of defections and suspensions of members from their party that have taken place throughout the present parliament.

Affiliation		Members
Affiliation		Elected in 2019^[2]	At dissolution in 2024^[3]^[4]^[5]^[e]	Difference
	Conservative	365	344	21
	Labour^[f]	202	205	3
	SNP	48	43	5
	Liberal Democrats	11	15	4
	DUP	8	7	1
	Sinn Féin	7	7
	Plaid Cymru	4	3	1
	SDLP	2	2
	Alba	N/A^[g]	2^[h]	2
	Green (E&W)	1	1
	Alliance	1	1
	Workers Party	N/A^[g]	1	1
	Reform UK^[i]	0	1	1
	Speaker	1	1
	Independent	0	17^[j]	17
Vacant		0	0
Total		650	650
Effective total voting^[k]		639	638	1^[l]
Majority		87	44^[12]	43

For full details of changes during the 2019-2024 Parliament, see By-elections and Defections, suspensions and resignations.

When local elections were held in 2021 the Conservative Party made gains, mainly at the expense of the Labour Party. Since then, the Conservative Party has had several high-profile political scandals and crises and has seen a decrease in their popularity in opinion polling. This was reflected in the poor results for the Conservative Party at both the 2022, 2023 and 2024 local elections. As a result of the 2023 local elections, Labour became the party with most members elected to local government for the first time since 2002.

In March 2022 the Labour Party abandoned all-women shortlists, citing legal advice that continuing to use them for choosing parliamentary candidates would be an unlawful practice under the Equality Act 2010, since the majority of Labour MPs were now women.^[13]

In September 2022, Liz Truss became Prime Minister, resigning after 49 days, becoming the shortest serving Prime Minister.^[14] In October 2022, Rishi Sunak became the third Prime Minister of the Parliament.^[14]

In March 2024, Reform UK announced an electoral pact with the Northern Irish unionist party TUV.^[15] The parties will stand mutually agreed candidates in Northern Ireland constituencies in the election.^[16] Reform UK also announced a pact with the Social Democratic Party (SDP), a minor socially conservative party.^[17]

On 22 May 2024 Rishi Sunak announced that he had advised the King to order the dissolution of Parliament and called a general election for 4 July 2024.^[18]

The election will be the first July general election since 1945,^[19] and the first to take place under the Dissolution and Calling of Parliament Act 2022, as well as the first under the reign of King Charles III.

Electoral system

General elections in the United Kingdom are organised using first-past-the-post voting. The Conservative Party, which won a majority at the 2019 general election, included pledges in its manifesto to remove the 15-year limit on voting for British citizens living abroad, and to introduce a voter identification requirement in Great Britain.^[20] These changes were included in the Elections Act 2022.

Boundary reviews

The Sixth Periodic Review of Westminster constituencies, which proposed reducing the number of constituencies from 650 to 600, commenced in 2011 but temporarily stopped in January 2013. Following the 2015 general election, each of the four parliamentary boundary commissions of the United Kingdom recommenced their review process in April 2016.^[21]^[22]^[23] The four commissions submitted their final recommendations to the Secretary of State on 5 September 2018^[24]^[25] and made their reports public a week later.^[26]^[27]^[28]^[24] However, the proposals were never put forward for approval before the calling of the general election held on 12 December 2019, and in December 2020 the reviews were formally abandoned under the Schedule to the Parliamentary Constituencies Act 2020.^[29]

A projection by psephologists Colin Rallings and Michael Thrasher of how the 2017 votes would have translated to seats under the 2018 boundaries suggested the changes would have been beneficial to the Conservative Party and detrimental to the Labour Party.^[30]^[31]

In March 2020, Cabinet Office minister Chloe Smith confirmed that the 2023 Periodic Review of Westminster constituencies would be based on retaining 650 seats.^[32]^[33] The previous relevant legislation was amended by the Parliamentary Constituencies Act 2020^[34] and the four boundary commissions formally launched their 2023 reviews on 5 January 2021.^[35]^[36]^[37]^[38] They were required to issue their final reports prior to 1 July 2023.^[29] Once the reports have been laid before Parliament, Orders in Council giving effect to the final proposals must be made within four months, unless "there are exceptional circumstances". Prior to the Parliamentary Constituencies Act 2020, boundary changes could not be implemented until they were approved by both Houses of Parliament.

The boundary changes were approved at a meeting of the Privy Council on 15 November 2023^[39] and came into force on 29 November 2023,^[40] meaning that the election will be contested on these new boundaries.^[41]

Notional 2019 results

The notional results of the 2019 election, if they had taken place under boundaries recommended by the Sixth Periodic Review.

The election will be contested under new constituency boundaries established by the 2023 Periodic Review of Westminster constituencies. Consequently, media outlets tend to report seat gains and losses as compared to notional results. These are the results if all votes cast in 2019 were unchanged, but regrouped by new constituency boundaries.^[42] Notional results in the UK are always estimated, usually with the assistance of local election results, because vote counts at parliamentary elections in the UK do not yield figures at any level more specific than that of the whole constituency.^[43]

In England, seats will be redistributed towards Southern England, away from Northern England, due to the different rates of population growth. North West England and North East England will lose two seats each whereas South East England will gain seven seats and South West England will gain three seats.^[44] Based on historical voting patterns, this is expected to help the Conservatives.^[45] Based on these new boundaries, different parties would have won several constituencies with unchanged names but changed boundaries in 2019. For example, the Conservatives would have won Wirral West and Leeds North West instead of the Labour Party, but Labour would have won Pudsey and Heywood & Middleton instead of the Conservatives. Westmorland and Lonsdale, the constituency represented by former Liberal Democrat leader Tim Farron, is now notionally a Conservative seat.

In Scotland, 57 MPs will be elected, down from the 59 in 2019, with the following notional partisan composition of Scotland's parliamentary delegation:^[46] The Scottish National Party would remain steady on 48 seats, despite two of their constituencies being dissolved. The Scottish Conservatives' seat count of six would likewise remain unchanged. Scottish Labour would have retained Edinburgh South, the sole constituency they won in 2019. Had the 2019 general election occurred with the new boundaries in effect, the Scottish Liberal Democrats would have only won two seats (Edinburgh West and Orkney and Shetland), instead of the four they did win that year, as the expanded electorates in the other two would overcome their slender majorities.

Under the new boundaries, Wales will lose eight seats, electing 32 MPs instead of the 40 they elected in 2019. Welsh Labour would have won 18 instead of the 22 MPs they elected in 2019, and the Welsh Conservatives 12 instead of 14. Due to the abolition and merging of rural constituencies in West Wales, Plaid Cymru would have only won two seats instead of four. Nonetheless, the boundaries are expected to cause difficulty for the Conservatives as more pro-Labour areas are added to some of their safest seats.^[47]

In Northern Ireland, the notional results are identical to the actual results of the 2019 general election in Northern Ireland.

Notional 2019 results on 2023 boundaries^[43]
Party		MPs
Party		2019 actual result	2019 notional result	Change
	Conservative	365	372	7
	Labour	202	200	2
	SNP	48	48
	Liberal Democrats	11	8	3
	DUP	8	8
	Sinn Féin	7	7
	Plaid Cymru	4	2	2
	SDLP	2	2
	Green	1	1
	Alliance	1	1
	Speaker	1	1

Date of the election

Originally the next election was scheduled to take place on 2 May 2024 under the Fixed-term Parliaments Act 2011.^[m] However, at the 2019 general election, in which the Conservatives won a majority of 80 seats, the party's manifesto contained a commitment to repeal the Fixed-term Parliaments Act.^[49] In December 2020, the government duly published a draft Fixed-term Parliaments Act 2011 (Repeal) Bill, later retitled the Dissolution and Calling of Parliament Act 2022.^[50] This entered into force on 24 March 2022. Thus, the prime minister can again request the monarch to dissolve Parliament and call an early election with 25 working days' notice. Section 4 of the Act provided: "If it has not been dissolved earlier, a Parliament dissolves at the beginning of the day that is the fifth anniversary of the day on which it first met."

The Electoral Commission confirmed that the 2019 Parliament would, therefore, have to be dissolved, at the latest, by 17 December 2024, and that the next general election had to take place no later than 28 January 2025.^[51]^[52]

With no election date fixed in law, there was speculation as to when Rishi Sunak, as prime minister, would call an election. On 18 December 2023, Sunak told journalists that the election would take place in 2024 rather than January 2025.^[1] On 4 January, he first suggested the general election would probably be in the second half of 2024.^[53] On 22 May 2024, after much speculation through the day,^[54]^[55]^[56] Sunak confirmed the election would be held on 4 July.^[57]

Timetable

Key dates^[58]
Date	Event
Wednesday 22 May	Prime Minister Rishi Sunak requests a dissolution of parliament from King Charles III and announces the date of polling day for the general election as 4 July.
Friday 24 May	Last sitting day of business. Parliament prorogued.
Thursday 30 May	Dissolution of parliament and official start of the campaign. Beginning of purdah. Royal Proclamation issued dissolving the 58th Parliament, summoning the 59th Parliament and setting the date for its first meeting.
Friday 7 June	Nominations of candidates close.
Thursday 13 June	Deadline to register to vote at 5pm in Northern Ireland.
Tuesday 18 June	Deadline to register to vote at 5pm in Great Britain.
Wednesday 19 June	Deadline to apply for a postal vote.
Wednesday 26 June	Deadline to register for a proxy vote at 5pm. Exemptions applied for emergencies.
Thursday 4 July	Polling Day – polls open from 7am to 10 pm.
Thursday 4 July–Friday 5 July	Results announced for all 650 constituencies.
Friday 5 July	End of purdah.
Tuesday 9 July	First meeting of the new Parliament of the United Kingdom, for the formal election of Speaker of the House of Commons.
Wednesday 17 July	State Opening of Parliament and King's Speech.

Campaign

On the afternoon of 22 May 2024, Sunak announced that the general election would be held on 4 July 2024, surprising his own MPs.^[59] The calling of the election was welcomed by Keir Starmer, Leader of the Opposition and the Labour Party,^[60] and by Ed Davey, leader of the Liberal Democrats.^[61]

On 23 May 2024, Sunak said that before the election there would be no flights to Rwanda for those seeking asylum.^[62] Immigration figures were published for 2023 showing immigration remained at historically high levels, but had fallen compared to 2022.^[63] Nigel Farage, the former leader of Reform UK, said on 23 May that he would not stand as a candidate in the election. Reform UK said they would stand in 630 seats across England, Scotland and Wales.^[64] On 23 May, Ed Davey launched the Liberal Democrat campaign in Cheltenham in Gloucestershire.^[65] The SNP campaign launch the same day was overshadowed over a dispute around leader John Swinney's support for Michael Matheson and developments in Operation Branchform.^[66]

Debates

The Conservatives challenged Keir Starmer to six televised debates.^[67] Labour announced that it would not agree to such a proposal, and offered two head-to-head debates - one shown on the BBC, and one shown on ITV; a spokesperson said both networks would offer the greatest audience, and the prospect of any debates on smaller channels would be rejected as it would not be a "valuable use of campaign time". Liberal Democrat leader Ed Davey proclaimed his wish to be included in "any televised debates".^[68]

Endorsements

Newspapers, organisations, and individuals have endorsed parties or individual candidates for the election.

Candidates

Details on MPs deselected or seeking a new constituency, MPs standing under a different political affiliation, former MPs seeking to return to Parliament, MPs changing constituencies, and incumbent MPs standing against each other are in the articles on Candidates in the 2024 United Kingdom general election.

Opinion polling

Section 'Graphical summary' not found

Notes

^ Stephen Flynn leads the SNP in the House of Commons.
^ Liz Saville Roberts leads Plaid Cymru in the House of Commons.
^ Neale Hanvey leads Alba in the House of Commons.
^ In Northern Ireland, voter ID was already required at elections before it was introduced in the rest of the UK.
^ On 29 May 2024, the UK Parliamentary website stated there were 345 Conservative MPs and 205 Labour MPs. However it describes Lloyd Russell-Moyle and Mark Logan as Labour and Conservative MPs respectively at the time of dissolution, despite Logan having defected from the Conservatives and Rusell-Moyle having lost the Labour Party whip prior to dissolution.^[6]^[7]
^ Includes 24 MPs sponsored by the Co-operative Party, who are designated Labour and Co-operative.^[8]
^ ^a ^b At the time of the 2019 election this party did not exist.
^ Both of the Alba Party's MPs, Kenny MacAskill and Neale Hanvey, were elected for the Scottish National Party (SNP) before leaving to join Alba in 2021.^[9]
^ Known as the Brexit Party at the 2019 election.
^ At the time of the dissolution of Parliament on 30 May 2024, eight of the independent MPs had been elected as Conservatives at the 2019 general election, including Andrew Bridgen, who defected to Reclaim in May 2023 but left the party in December 2023 and for the remainder of the 2019–2024 Parliament sat as an independent. The remaining nine independent MPs all came from the opposition benches.
^ In 2019-24, the seven members of Sinn Féin abstained; i.e., they did not take their seats in the House of Commons;^[10] the speaker and deputy speakers (at this Parliament's dissolution, three Conservative and one Labour) by convention exercise only a casting vote.^[11]
^ Deputy speaker Eleanor Laing (Con, Chair of Ways and Means) was on an extended leave of absence, and Roger Gale (Con) served as an additional acting deputy speaker from December 2022 until the end of the Parliament.
^ The Fixed-term Parliaments Act automatically scheduled general elections for the first Thursday in May of the fifth year after the previous general election.^[48] The previous election was held in December 2019.

References

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^ "General election latest: Rishi Sunak announces 4 July vote in Downing Street statement". BBC News. 22 May 2024. Retrieved 22 May 2024.
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^ ^a ^b "2018 Review". Boundary Commission for Northern Ireland. 16 February 2016. Archived from the original on 8 July 2018. Retrieved 17 September 2018.
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^ ^a ^b "Parliamentary Constituencies Act 2020". Archived from the original on 6 August 2021.
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[1] Stephen Flynn leads the SNP in the House of Commons.

[2] Liz Saville Roberts leads Plaid Cymru in the House of Commons.

[3] Neale Hanvey leads Alba in the House of Commons.

[NI-5] In Northern Ireland, voter ID was already required at elections before it was introduced in the rest of the UK.

[12] On 29 May 2024, the UK Parliamentary website stated there were 345 Conservative MPs and 205 Labour MPs. However it describes Lloyd Russell-Moyle and Mark Logan as Labour and Conservative MPs respectively at the time of dissolution, despite Logan having defected from the Conservatives and Rusell-Moyle having lost the Labour Party whip prior to dissolution.^[6]^[7]

[Labour-14] Includes 24 MPs sponsored by the Co-operative Party, who are designated Labour and Co-operative.^[8]

[newparty-15] At the time of the 2019 election this party did not exist.

[17] Both of the Alba Party's MPs, Kenny MacAskill and Neale Hanvey, were elected for the Scottish National Party (SNP) before leaving to join Alba in 2021.^[9]

[18] Known as the Brexit Party at the 2019 election.

[indies-19] At the time of the dissolution of Parliament on 30 May 2024, eight of the independent MPs had been elected as Conservatives at the 2019 general election, including Andrew Bridgen, who defected to Reclaim in May 2023 but left the party in December 2023 and for the remainder of the 2019–2024 Parliament sat as an independent. The remaining nine independent MPs all came from the opposition benches.

[voting_total-22] In 2019-24, the seven members of Sinn Féin abstained; i.e., they did not take their seats in the House of Commons;^[10] the speaker and deputy speakers (at this Parliament's dissolution, three Conservative and one Labour) by convention exercise only a casting vote.^[11]

[deputyspeakers-23] Deputy speaker Eleanor Laing (Con, Chair of Ways and Means) was on an extended leave of absence, and Roger Gale (Con) served as an additional acting deputy speaker from December 2022 until the end of the Parliament.

[61] The Fixed-term Parliaments Act automatically scheduled general elections for the first Thursday in May of the fifth year after the previous general election.^[48] The previous election was held in December 2019.

[politics-date-confirmed-4] "Rishi Sunak announces 4 July general election". BBC News. 22 May 2024.

[6] "Election 2019: Results". BBC News. Retrieved 10 December 2022.

[parliament-7] "State of the parties". UK Parliament. 29 May 2024. Retrieved 15 June 2024.

[8] Jon Craig (30 May 2024). "Conservative Mark Logan defects to Labour - saying 'we need a new government'". Sky News. Retrieved 15 June 2024.

[9] Jennifer McKiernan and Charlotte Wright (29 May 2024). "Labour suspends MP Russell-Moyle over complaint". Retrieved 15 June 2024.

[10] "Parliamentary career for Lloyd Russell-Moyle". Parliament.UK. Retrieved 15 June 2024.

[11] "Parliamentary career for Mark Logan". Parliament.UK. Retrieved 15 June 2024.

[13] "About: Members of Parliament". Co-operative Party. Retrieved 10 May 2024.

[16] Webster, Laura (27 March 2021). "MP Kenny MacAskill quits SNP to join Alex Salmond's Alba Party". The National. Retrieved 27 March 2021.

[abstain-20] Kelly, Conor (19 August 2019). "Understanding Sinn Féin's Abstention from the UK Parliament". E-International Relations. Retrieved 16 December 2019.

[21] Boothroyd, David. "House of Commons: Tied Divisions". United Kingdom Election Results. Archived from the original on 6 March 2008. Retrieved 3 June 2024.

[24] Zodgekar, Ketaki; Baker, Finn (8 May 2024). "What is the government's current working majority?". Institute for Government. Retrieved 10 May 2024.

[HuffPost-25] Rogers, Alexandra (7 March 2022). "Exclusive: Labour Drops All-Women Shortlists For Next General Election". HuffPost. Archived from the original on 26 March 2022. Retrieved 26 March 2022.

[pm-list-26] "British Prime Ministers | University of Oxford". www.ox.ac.uk. Retrieved 20 October 2022.

[27] Crisp, James (16 March 2024). "Reform strikes election pact with hardline Northern Ireland party". The Telegraph. Archived from the original on 16 March 2024. Retrieved 17 March 2024.

[28] "TUV conference: Jim Allister announces partnership with Reform UK". BBC News. 16 March 2024. Archived from the original on 23 May 2024. Retrieved 16 March 2024. ;"The future of DUP big hitters could now lie in Jim Allister's hands". Belfast Telegraph. 16 March 2024. Archived from the original on 16 March 2024. Retrieved 16 March 2024.

[29] SDP (22 October 2022). "Reform UK and SDP Agree General Election Pact". SDP. Archived from the original on 22 October 2022. Retrieved 21 May 2024.

[30] "General election latest: Rishi Sunak announces 4 July vote in Downing Street statement". BBC News. 22 May 2024. Retrieved 22 May 2024.

[31] ttps://www.standard.co.uk/news/politics/labour-party-mps-winston-churchill-parliament-conservatives-b1159645.html

[conman-32] "Our Plan - Conservative Manifesto 2019". Conservative Party. Archived from the original on 16 December 2019. Retrieved 17 December 2019.

[33] "Boundary review launched". Boundary Commission for England. 24 February 2016. Archived from the original on 26 December 2016. Retrieved 30 October 2019.

[34] "2018 Review of Westminster Parliamentary constituencies". Boundary Commission for Scotland. Archived from the original on 30 October 2019. Retrieved 30 October 2019.

[35] "2018 Review". Boundary Commission for Wales. Archived from the original on 27 September 2019. Retrieved 30 October 2019.

[:6-36] "2018 Review". Boundary Commission for Northern Ireland. 16 February 2016. Archived from the original on 8 July 2018. Retrieved 17 September 2018.

[37] "Towards final recommendations (and beyond)". Boundary Commission for England. Archived from the original on 8 July 2018. Retrieved 8 July 2018.

[38] "2018 Review". Boundary Commission for England. Archived from the original on 10 September 2018. Retrieved 17 September 2018.

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v t e 2024 United Kingdom general election
← 2019 election Candidates Constituencies Debates Endorsements MPs elected seniority lost their seat stood down Notional results Opinion polling Parties Results breakdown by constituency Target seats next election →
Incumbent prime minister: Rishi Sunak (Conservative) Appointed prime minister: TBD
Parties elected to the House of Commons before the election	Conservative - Rishi Sunak manifesto Labour - Keir Starmer manifesto Scottish National Party John Swinney Liberal Democrats Ed Davey Democratic Unionist Party Gavin Robinson Sinn Féin Mary Lou McDonald Plaid Cymru Rhun ap Iorwerth Social Democratic and Labour Party Colum Eastwood Green Party of England and Wales Carla Denyer Adrian Ramsay Alliance Party of Northern Ireland Naomi Long Workers Party George Galloway Reform UK Nigel Farage
Results by country and region	England (list) East of England East Midlands London North East England North West England South East England South West England West Midlands Yorkshire and the Humber Northern Ireland (list) Scotland (list) Wales (list)
Related topics	Glossary of terms "Things Can Only Get Better" Red wall Blue wall Sea wall Stevenage woman 2024 State Opening of Parliament
2024 UK local elections

v t e Elections and referendums in the United Kingdom
General elections	1801 1802 1806 1807 1812 1818 1820 1826 1830 1831 1832 1835 1837 1841 1847 1852 1857 1859 1865 1868 1874 1880 1885 1886 1892 1895 1900 1906 1910 (Jan) 1910 (Dec) 1918 1922 1923 1924 1929 1931 1935 1945 1950 1951 1955 1959 1964 1966 1970 1974 (Feb) 1974 (Oct) 1979 1983 1987 1992 1997 2001 2005 2010 2015 2017 2019 2024 Next
Local elections	1889 1890 1892 1894 1895 1896 1897 1898 1899 1900 1901 1902 1903 1904 1905 1906 1907 1908 1909 1910 1911 1912 1913 1914 1915 1919 1920 1921 1922 1923 1924 1925 1926 1927 1928 1929 1930 1931 1932 1933 1934 1935 1936 1937 1938 1945 1946 1947 1948 1949 1950 1951 1952 1953 1954 1955 1956 1957 1958 1959 1960 1961 1962 1963 1964 1965 1966 1967 1968 1969 1970 1971 1972 1973 1974 1975 1976 1977 1978 1979 1980 1981 1982 1983 1984 1985 1986 1987 1988 1989 1990 1991 1992 1993 1994 1995 1996 1997 1998 1999 2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 2019 2021 2022 2023 2024 2025
European elections	1979 1984 1989 1994 1999 2004 2009 2014 2019
Referendums	1975 2011 2016