Boris Johnson suffered an electoral defeat in a Conservative stronghold and could raise important questions about his leadership

British Prime Minister Boris Johnson was A severe setback after his conservative party lost a historic stronghold in a by-election This can generate important doubts about your driving during training.

Johnson faced several scandals and loss of popularity in public opinion and in his ranks He had a kind of referendum in the elections that took place In a rural constituency in North Shropshire.

His party always controls the constituency of just 80,000 voters in Thursday’s vote by the Liberal Democratic Party, to which its candidate belongs. Helen Morgan won nearly 6000 votes on the sidelines To a representative of the Conservative Party, based on official results announced Friday.

Morgan received 17,957 votes, 46.3% of the total, while conservative candidate Neil Shastri Hearst received 12,032 votes, losing the ordinance he held during his nearly 200-year training.

The result could exacerbate the party’s discontent with the Johnson government, which Already lived the rebellion of a quarter of the conservative bench on Tuesday Vote on new restrictions against COVID-19.

Amid the wave of the epidemic, with a record number of infections recorded Thursday (more than 88 thousand), Johnson It required the support of the labor opposition to implement the new health measures.

The winning constituency candidate claimed that voters sent a message “loud and clear” to Johnson that “game is over”.

Helen Morgan takes over from Owen Patterson, who has held the position since 1997 and the majority winner in the 2019 election.

But Patterson was forced to resign amid accusations of pressuring members of Johnson’s administration to defend the interests of two companies that paid him, a scandal that has distracted the prime minister.

Conservative defeat loomed as an increasingly plausible possibility.

“It just confirms what I, my family and many other people have been thinking for a long time: this man is unfit to be prime minister,” North Shropshire resident Gary Churchill, 71, told AFP.

“I will vote for the Liberal Democrats because I am offended by Johnson’s performance,” said Martin Hill, the 68-year-old labor activist, who, like others in the constituency, chose the “tactical vote” to defeat the Conservatives.

Before knowing the end result, Conservative MP Edward Timpson realized the series Sky News It’s going to be a “very hard night for his party”.

A spokesman for the Liberal Democratic Party had predicted a “disaster” for Johnson in the election, which… They had a low participation rate of 46.3%, far from the 62.9% recorded in 2019.

right Now, The Prime Minister may be threatened by sending letters of confidence from party members, Action necessary to hold an internal vote to remove it.

According to the conservative newspaper daily telegraph, “Some MPs have privately suggested that the loss of North Shropshire would be the final nail in the coffin for Johnson’s leadership.”

And if he loses the leadership of the party, Johnson will also have to relinquish the reins of Downing Street, As happened to her predecessor Theresa May in 2019.

Vaccines to boost popularity

The situation is the exact opposite of what it was last May, when the Conservatives, whose popularity has soared thanks to a successful COVID-19 vaccination campaign, seized from Labor opposition their historic stronghold, Hartlepool, in north-east England.

Now the coronavirus is once again a major concern among the Britons, who a few days before the Christmas holidays are seeing more and more events canceled and They are required to limit interactions between the unprecedented increase in infection.

To prevent hospitals from being outdone again, Johnson has set himself a challenging goal of providing a booster dose for all adults by the end of the year.

This logistical challenge involves one million daily injections, as more vaccination centers have been opened for longer hours. But nothing guarantees that, even if it is realized, it will be enough to return the lost popularity to the leader.

(With information from AFP)

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