Francesca Gillett
BBC News

We're finishing our live coverage now - thanks for following.

To read our full report on the by-election wins, head here - or for some analysis by polling expert John Curtice, that's here.

Today's live coverage was by Chas Geiger, Andre Rhoden-Paul, Antoinette Radford, Jo Couzens, Sam Francis and me, Francesca Gillett.

Francesca Gillett
Live reporter

Image source, PA Media

It's been just over 12 hours since Labour achieved victories in two by-elections, on big swings. We've had lots of political reaction since then. Before we sign off for the day, here's a rundown of the latest:

• Huge wins: Labour took two previously rock-solid Tory seats from the Conservatives - first of all Tamworth, overturning a 19,000 majority, and then repeating the success in Mid Bedfordshire. It was an outstanding success for Labour, and one of the Tories' worst by-election nights ever
• Tamworth: The seat saw its second biggest swing from the Conservatives since World War Two. New MP Sarah Edwards said it showed voters wanted a "fresh start", and had a message for PM Rishi Sunak to "do the decent thing and call a general election"
• Mid Beds: Former maths teacher Alistair Strathern is the new MP here - a seat that the Tories have held for more than 90 years. Labour has never won it before, and the 24,664 Tory majority was the biggest to be overturned in a by-election
• "Gamechanger": That was the reaction from Sir Keir Starmer, who visited both constituencies today for victory rallies. He hailed the wins as “extraordinary", suggesting they were "history in the making" and Labour was "redrawing the political map"
• Tory reaction: But the Tories say there’s no enthusiasm for Starmer or his party, it’s just that Conservative voters stayed at home. There was "no real love for Labour" on the doorstep and by-elections are always tricky, said Education Secretary Gillian Keegan. Other Tories are harsher on the government - saying it shows they need to change tack and offer voters tax cuts and other policies to persuade them to turn out
• What does this mean for a general election? If replicated at a general election, results like last night's would not just mean Conservative defeat - they would mean Tory annihilation, writes our chief political correspondent. Polling guru Prof John Curtice unpacks it further - saying that while it shows the Tories in deep electoral trouble, we can't presume they would do as badly if there was a general election anytime soon. So when might that election come - and could Labour's wins affect when Rishi Sunak decides to call it? We answer that here

Did Tory voters stay at home?published at 15:27 British Summer Time 20 October 2023

15:27 BST 20 October 2023

Education Secretary Gillian Keegan said of the by-election results: "If you look at the details this does not show a swing to Labour, it showed Conservative voters not coming out."

First of all, the details clearly do show a swing to Labour - it was 23.9% in Tamworth and 20.5% in Mid Bedfordshire.

But what the Conservative Party has been suggesting is that voters did not switch from the Conservatives to Labour. The argument is that about the same number of people voted Labour as in 2019, but lots of Conservative supporters did not vote.

But the by-elections were secret ballots, so we don’t know if Keegan is right.

It could also be that lots of the people who voted Conservative last time decided to vote Labour this time, or decided to vote for another party such as Reform UK.

Alex Phillips, a spokesperson for Reform UK - the party that emerged from the ashes of the Brexit Party nearly three years ago - says the Tory Party needs to remember they are right-wing politicians, and the only way to do that is to “challenge them in their own backyard”.

Phillips tells BBC Politics Live the Conservatives feel they “own a vote”, and "what you end up with is political disenchantment".

In both Tamworth and Mid Bedfordshire, the number of votes Reform UK got exceeded the winning Labour candidate's majority over the Conservatives.

When asked if Reform UK will stand candidates in every single seat in the upcoming election, Phillips says that is “absolutely the plan”.

"It could have been worse," says North Warwickshire MP Craig Tracey, who helped run the Conservative campaign in Tamworth.

He told the BBC the Tories were somewhat comforted that the problem was their voters staying at home.

"I think if we'd seen the Labour vote increase by 5,000, I'd have been more worried," he explained.

To get those Tory voters to turn out, Tracey said: "It is all about delivery - they [voters] have had rhetoric for too long... People need to feel better now."

Image source, Getty Images

Away from the by-election results, we're hearing BBC director general Tim Davie is scheduled to address Conservative MPs in Parliament next week.

He's due to address the 1922 Committee of backbench Tory MPs on Wednesday.

Sir Graham Brady, who chairs the committee, has told BBC News the meeting was arranged several weeks ago, before recent events.

He adds that Davie hasn't been asked to speak about anything specific, and that the committee does have non-political speakers, such as Bank of England Governor Andrew Bailey and tech billionaire Bill Gates.

But Labour MP Justin Madders has said on X, formerly Twitter, external, that Davie should talk to MPs from all the parties, not just some of them.

The BBC press office has been approached for comment.

Conservative peer and pollster Lord Hayward agrees it was a "very bad night" for the Tories. and he says it was a good one for Labour.

But, he tells BBC Radio 4's World at One, there is little evidence of people switching parties. "Literally tens of thousands" of Conservative voters stayed at home, he says, adding that Labour won fewer votes in Mid Bedfordshire than it had in the 2019 general election.

His conclusion - there is still a lot to play for, for his party.

John Hayes, who chairs the backbench Common Sense Group of Tory MPs, says while politicians shouldn't dismiss the results of elections, “it would be a huge mistake to extrapolate from these results”.

Hayes says the party should “fight the next election on our territory, not Labour’s” and focus on Conservative priorities - like immigration and public order.

Devizes MP Danny Kruger, who co-chairs the New Conservatives group of mainly "Red Wall" MPs, agrees, telling BBC Radio 4's World at One the Brexit referendum result showed "ordinary people... wanted their country back" - and the government had yet to deliver this.

He describes the results as a "wake-up call", saying the Tories can still win the next election if they get their vote out by standing up for voters' values - on migration, sex education in schools, gender issues and taxation.

Kruger says the PM has the "right instincts" - but needs to lean in, in a more coherent way, as he has already started to do on net zero.

Image source, Reuters

Shadow health secretary Wes Streeting has called the by-election results "extraordinary" and "historic".

"They are also remarkable given where Labour was in 2019 when people asked whether the Labour Party would continue to exist as a force in British politics," he told BBC Politics Live.

Labour had changed and could now offer the country "the change it deserves", he said, before adding: "We're certainly not complacent - we've been around this block too many times."

Streeting said he believes "decent Conservatives are horrified" by what's happened to the Tory party.

Leila Nathoo
Political correspondent

It’s up to Rishi Sunak to decide when – between now and January 2025 – to call a general election. May or Autumn of next year look to be the most likely options.

Will these by-election hammerings for his party convince the prime minister he needs as much time as he has got to try to turn things around before going to the country?

The Tories are way behind in the national opinion polls and this gap could widen further.

A recent poll by Savanta suggested that Rishi Sunak’s big Tory conference speech – in which he pitched himself as the change candidate – has barely moved the dial.

More time could allow the economy to improve – giving more scope for the government to offer some pre-election sweeteners. Tax cuts are already top of the wish-list of a number of Tory MPs who think they would energise their core vote again.

But those unhappy with the party’s direction of travel under Rishi Sunak are likely to become noisier after today – and more time before an election means more room for disagreements within the party to boil over.

Rishi Sunak has already tried big policy shifts and a reset moment to try to win more support – but he’s running out of options as the clock ticks down.

The historically bad results for the Conservatives at yesterday's by-elections has led to speculation at what could happen at the next general election.

When is the next general election due?

UK general elections - where all 650 MPs are elected to the House of Commons - have to be no more than five years apart.

The next election is therefore due by January 2025, external.

This represents five years from the day the current Parliament first met in 17 December 2019 - plus the time required to run an election campaign.

Who can call an early election?

The prime minister can call an early election, but this has not always been the case.

In 2011, a law was passed which removed the PM's power to decide the date of an election, and instead handed control to the House of Commons.

Under those rules an early election could only be held under certain circumstances - such as if two-thirds of MPs agreed.

However, after winning the 2019 election, the Conservatives introduced a new law called the Dissolution and Calling of Parliament Act 2022, external.

This restored the PM's power to call elections at a time of their choosing, within the five-year period.

Read more here.

Lib Dem deputy leader Daisy Cooper says this has been "one of the most unpredictable Parliaments of all time".

The Lib Dem MP for St Albans told BBC Politics Live the by-elections show her party is winning over life-long Tory voters.

While Tamworth was a two-horse race between Labour and the Tories, Mid Bedfordshire was a three-way scrap with the Lib Dems also hoping to win, and getting 9,420 votes.

She said Mid Bedfordshire was also "unpredictable" and the Lib Dems played "an instrumental role" in defeating the Conservatives there yesterday and that points to the role the party will play in the next general election. More from Cooper when she spoke to Breakfast earlier:

Our correspondents Ione Wells and Helen Catt were at the counts last night and tell us why these by-election results matter.

Image source, PA Media

A number of Conservatives this morning have held to the party line that their defeats in Tamworth and Mid Bedfordshire were the result of voter apathy in by-elections - rather than a significant swing to Labour.

But among a few publicly critical Tory voices, former Brexit minister Lord Frost has accused the party leadership of sticking to a “strategy of denial”, which he says is not working.

In a lengthy post on X, external, he describes the by-election results as "extremely bad for my party... and I don’t think it helps to suggest otherwise".

"The current national polls are dreadful for us but these results are even *worse*," he continues.

Frost, who's been pressing for the Tories to return to their tax-cutting roots, adds: "If your voters don't want to come out and vote for you then you don't win elections. It's as simple as that."

In the case of Mid Bedfordshire: never.

Labour has never previously held the seat, and today's result is the biggest majority to ever be overturned at a by-election after Nadine Dorries won just four years ago by 24,664 seats.

The seat of Tamworth was last held by Labour from 1997 to 2010, by MP Brian Jenkins, before being won by Conservative Chris Pincher. The seat has been held by the Tories from 2010 to now.

The Labour leader spoke to the BBC's Nick Eardley earlier at the first of his two victory rallies, calling the results a "gamechanger". Here's what he had to say:

Image source, Getty Images

Reform UK leader Richard Tice has pointed out that, in both Tamworth and Mid Bedfordshire, the number of votes his party got exceeded the winning Labour candidate's majority over the Conservatives.

Reform UK, formerly the Brexit Party, won 1,373 votes (5.4%) in Tamworth - where the Labour majority was 1,316 - and 1,487 votes (3.7%) in Mid Beds - where the majority was 1,192.

Tice wrote on X, external that Reform had twice in one night ensured the Tories lost a seat, despite "huge pressure" from the Conservatives on people not to vote for Reform.

Polling guru Prof John Curtice has also pointed out that the Tories risked seeing votes drift to Labour on the left and Reform UK on the right.

Image source, PA Media

Alistair Strathern, MP for Mid Bedfordshire:

• Grew up in Bedfordshire and lived there his whole life
• Attended Oxford University where he co-chaired the student Labour group
• Worked as a maths teacher before joining the Bank of England
• A councillor and cabinet member on Waltham Forest Council in East London

Sarah Edwards, MP for Tamworth:

• Born and grew up in Moseley, Birmingham. She says "public service runs through my family" - her dad was an English teacher and mum and brother work in the NHS
• Studied spatial design, a subset of architecture, at Central Saint Martins in London
• Worked for Oxfam on fundraising and events and later for Unite the Union
• A former NHS governor

Sir Keir Starmer has now moved on to Tamworth, just north-east of Birmingham, where he praises winner Sarah Edwards as a "fantastic" candidate and tells party activists they did "an incredible job".

He says Labour "absolutely smashed it" in the constituency, with voters "fed up to the back teeth with 13 years of decline" under the Tories and wanting a fresh start with a changed Labour Party.

Tory voters put their trust in Labour yesterday, he tells the crowd at Tamworth FC, and says the party would go on making its positive case "humbly" across the country.

To cheers, Edwards tells activists that Tamworth was given a "real choice" by Labour and voted for a "fresh start".