Green Party wins major by-election in northern England city of Manchester
Monday, March 2, 2026
The Green Party of England and Wales candidate Hannah Spencer has been declared the winner of Thursday's by-election in Gorton and Denton, a parliamentary constituency in Manchester, which was triggered following the resignation of the previous Labour MP Andrew Gwynne.
The election marks the first parliamentary by-election won by a Green Party candidate, and the first Green Party election win in the North of England. Spencer will become the fifth current Green Party MP, with just under 41% of the vote, a lead of 12% on the second-place candidate, Matt Goodwin of Reform UK, who received just under 29% of the vote.
The election was highly anticipated as a test of confidence for the current Labour government, which has seen numerous high-profile scandals over past months. The Labour candidate received 25% of the vote, dropping 25% from the 50% won at the 2024 general election. The seat was previously regarded as the sixth safest seat for the party in Britain, and had not been lost by a Labour Party candidate since 1931.
Mayor of Greater Manchester Andy Burnham had applied to stand as the party's candidate, but was blocked by its National Executive Committee over a worry that Labour would lose the resulting by-election for Mayor, and amid fears he would mount a leadership challenge against Prime Minister Keir Starmer.
Former Deputy Leader of the Labour Party and former Deputy Prime Minister Angela Rayner said that "This result must be a wake up call" amid the election adding to mounting internal party pressure on Keir Starmer to resign following the election, which would trigger a leadership election within his party. Starmer said in a statement that he was not planning to resign over the election results.
The Reform UK candidate Matt Goodwin's 29% of the vote was up 15% from the party's position in the constituency at the 2024 general election. Talking to BBC News reporters, Goodwin blamed the Green Party win on "a coalition of Islamists and woke progressives that came together to dominate a constituency", and said "many people in this country will look at Gorton and Denton and be appalled by what they see."
The Conservative and Liberal Democrat parties both won just under 2% of the vote, with the Conservatives dropping 6% from the previous election, and the Liberal Democrats dropping 2%. …