Labour reclaims Red Wall in Staffordshire

Sir Keir Starmer visited Stoke-on-Trent numerous times during the election to campaign to back local Labour candidates

If the last general election was about the Conservatives dismantling the so-called Red Wall, this one was about Labour rebuilding it.

But with voters now less likely to remain loyal to just one party, it may be that there is no such thing as a safe seat for either party any more.

After the 2019 general election, every parliamentary seat in Stoke-on-Trent and the wider county of Staffordshire was occupied by a Tory

Less than five years later, voters in all three Stoke-on-Trent constituencies have returned Labour MPs, something which had previously been the norm there and in this kind of post-industrial area of the Midlands.

High profile MPs - including the Tory deputy chair Jonathan Gullis and veteran MP Sir Michael Fabricant - failed in their bids to be re-elected this time around.

Fabricant deposed after 27 years

In a sign of how important the area was to Sir Keir Starmer, he made multiple visits to Stoke-on-Trent and Staffordshire to back local Labour candidates.

His party took seats elsewhere in the county too, in places like Lichfield, which had consistently voted for the same Conservative MP for nearly 30 years.

In the case of Mr Fabricant, he had been the MP for Lichfield since 1997 (and in Mid Staffordshire since 1992) where over time he had built up a majority of more than 23,000 votes.

Meanwhile, Stoke-on-Trent was at the heart of the Conservative government’s Levelling Up (LU) project.

The city received more LU funding than anywhere else in the country, and its three Conservative MPs were regularly seen at meetings in Downing Street to lobby for the city.

Despite this, many people in Stoke-on-Trent feel as if they have not seen an improvement in their living standards and the promises made back in 2019 have not brought them anything tangible.

Still a Conservative presence

It is a verdict they delivered to the politicians via the ballot box, and it is now Labour’s turn to show it can make the most of the opportunity the party has been given, to turn things around and retain backing from local voters.

The Conservatives’ next battle here will be the fight to retain control over the county council, at local elections in May 2025.

After that they will likely be looking to re-group and prepare a strategy for winning back seats such as Stafford and Lichfield, where they have previously enjoyed success.

The party will take some comfort, though, that they did not lose rural seats such as the Staffordshire Moorlands; Stone, Great Wyrley and Penkridge; or Kingswinford and South Staffordshire, this time around although they did lose Burton and Uttoxeter to Labour.

Although Labour can argue it won back the Red Wall, there remains a sizeable Conservative presence here.