By Staff Writer
17:12:2021

On Friday, the UK’s Tory/Conservative party lost the North Shropshire seat to the Liberal Democrats’ Helen Morgan. The Pro-Brexit seat had been held by the Tory’s for almost 200 years, and was seen as relatively safe, only being made vacant since the previous Tory MP, Owen Paterson, had resigned over flouting lobbying regulations.

Ms Morgan overturned a 23 thousand deficit to win by over 6 thousand votes, with many previous Tory supporters being frustrated over Tory economic policies. “The people of North Shropshire have spoken on behalf of the British people. They have said loudly and clearly: ‘Boris Johnson, the party is over,’” Helen Morgan, the newly-elected member of Parliament, said in her victory speech. The Tory’s Co-Chair, Oliver Downen, responded, saying that the party received a “kicking” and that it had heard voters.

This comes in a week wherein Prime Minister Boris Johnson faced a rebellion, with almost a hundred fellow Tory MPs voting against his new Covid-19 restrictions, which were only approved due to support from Labour. Further, Johnson’s popularity has also drastically dropped following reports of a Christmas party in Downing Street in December last year, while most Brits at the time were amid severe restrictions aimed at preventing the then Beta variant. Despite footage of senior officials rehearsing responses to the predicted leak, the government has continued to deny the party.

Johnson remains popular, with the Tory’s having a large majority in Westminster. Further, even though polls place Labour as leading, were an election to be held today, the Tory would still win, owing to districts, demographics and the UK’s first past the post system. Further, the Liberal Democrats are notorious for performing well in bi-elections despite Tory losses yet losing in national polls. However, the Tory are infamous for deposing leaders once they’re deemed not electable, as seen with the 1990 removal of Margaret Thatcher; there is thus likely to be an attempt to contest Johnson, but for the moment, it is expected to fail.