Absolutely Not The Daily Troll-o-Graph

 Labour’s vote share fell 32.2 per cent in worrying sign before May elections GB News Published: 11/04/2025 - Link Reform UK delivered a crushing electoral blow to Labour last night with a thumping by-election win, despite a Cabinet Minister campaigning on behalf of Labour. The disruptor party scooped almost 50 per cent of the vote in the ward of Longdendale (Tameside) just east of Manchester which falls within Business Secretary Jonathan Reynolds’ Stalybridge and Hyde constituency. The Cabinet Minister, who recently came under fire for his claims about his career as a solicitor, leant his weight to Labour’s campaign yesterday, but it was not enough to hold off the Reform surge. Reform’s Allan Hopwood scooped 46.6 per cent of the vote, beating Labour’s Francesca Coates into second (25 per cent) and Kieron Wild of the Conservatives (12.4 per cent). It means Hopwood has become Reform’s first councillor in Greater Manchester, a traditionally safe Labour area that elected 25 Labour mem...

A constitutional outrage”, declared the Speaker, John Bercow; “a very British coup”, said the shadow chancellor, John McDonnell. Not to be outdone, Nicola Sturgeon added “the day any semblance of British democracy died”. Some have compared the situation to 1628, when Charles I prorogued parliament before dispensing with its services entirely. But Charles I was not, unless the history books are grievously mistaken, faced with the problem of implementing the outcome of a referendum. It is time perhaps to tone down the rhetoric and consider the facts. The five-week prorogation appears longer than it is because it includes the three weeks of the party conference season, when parliament does not normally sit. Parliament therefore loses two weeks. In 2014 there was a longer prorogation of 20 days, though that included the period of the European parliament elections and the Whitsun recess. But of course the objection to prorogation has less to do with the time lost than its alleged pu...