Polling stations opened at seven o'clock this morning in Holborn and St Pancras, where voters are electing a successor to Sir Keir Starmer barely four months after he announced his resignation as prime minister and brought one of the most turbulent chapters in modern Labour history to a close.
The contest is the first parliamentary test of public opinion since Andy Burnham entered Downing Street in July, and it carries a symbolism that neither main contender has sought to play down. Labour's candidate, Sagal Abdi-Wali, is defending a majority of 11,500 secured by Sir Keir at the 2024 general election. Her principal challenger is Zack Polanski, the Green Party leader, who has poured activists and resources into the north London seat in the hope of securing his party's second parliamentary by-election victory of the year.
The Greens announced in February that Hannah Spencer, a 34 year old plumber, had captured Gorton and Denton to record the party's first ever Westminster by-election win. A second victory, in the seat held by the former prime minister himself, would be a prize of an altogether different magnitude.
A seat Labour has never lost
Holborn and St Pancras has returned Labour members since its creation in 1983. Sir Keir won it by more than 30,500 votes in 2017 and by nearly 28,000 in 2019, before his majority was cut to 11,500 at the last general election. Party strategists privately concede that the Greens' intensive campaign, built around housing costs and the environment, has made the race competitive, though Labour remains the firm favourite with bookmakers and pollsters alike.
Turnout is expected to be the decisive factor. By-elections in safe seats historically draw fewer than half the voters who attend a general election, and canvassers from both campaigns reported a quiet but steady flow at polling stations across Camden this morning.
The By-Election at a Glance
- The seat was vacated by Sir Keir Starmer, who held it from 2015 and resigned as prime minister on 22 June 2026.
- Labour's Sagal Abdi-Wali is projected to retain the seat, with Green leader Zack Polanski mounting an intensive challenge.
- Sir Keir's 2024 majority was 11,500, down from nearly 28,000 in 2019.
- A Green victory would echo February's Gorton and Denton upset, the party's first Westminster by-election win.
- Polls close at 10pm, with a result expected in the early hours of Friday.
Meanwhile, in Berlin
The Prime Minister is spending polling day abroad. Mr Burnham is in Berlin for talks with Chancellor Friedrich Merz on a proposed joint security partnership to counter sabotage, cyber attacks and other hybrid threats, alongside discussions on support for Ukraine, instability in the Middle East and disruption to global trade routes.
The visit is Mr Burnham's most significant engagement on the continent since he took office in July as Britain's seventh prime minister in a decade. Officials in both capitals describe the proposed pact as practical rather than rhetorical: shared intelligence on attacks against infrastructure, coordinated responses to state sponsored hacking and closer alignment on the security of shipping lanes.
Downing Street has been careful to separate the two stories. A spokesman said the Prime Minister would be kept informed of the count "as a matter of routine" but that his attention was on the Berlin talks, which are expected to conclude with a joint statement this afternoon.
What the result will, and will not, tell us
By-elections are unreliable prophets. Gorton and Denton did not prevent Labour from winning the Makerfield by-election in June, the victory that returned Mr Burnham to Parliament and set in motion Sir Keir's departure. Nor did the Greens' spring surge translate into control of any council in May.
Yet the psychological stakes are plain. A comfortable Labour hold would steady nerves in a party that lost its leader, its health secretary and its defence secretary in the space of five weeks this summer. A Green gain, or even a narrow Labour margin, would hand Mr Polanski the loudest megaphone of his leadership and revive questions about the Government's grip on metropolitan England.
Counting begins at ten o'clock tonight at Camden Town Hall. The Greenwich Journal will carry the result and full analysis as soon as it is declared.