Labour plays down ‘moonshot’ chances of winning ‘super-safe’ Tory seats in double by-election

Labour has played down its chances of winning the “super-safe” Tory seats of Tamworth and Mid Bedfordshire as voters head to the polls in two by-election tests for Rishi Sunak.

Sir Keir Starmer’s spokesman the “moonshot” chances would require Labour to overturn results larger than those seen in Selby, north Yorkshire.

“Winning either of these seats would be a moonshot for us so it’s worth keeping a sense of perspective around just how safe these Tory seats are – neither of them are on our target list,” he said.

But as the expectation management game continued, Tory party chairman Greg Hands also dismissed his party’s chances. “Governments don’t win by-elections,” he told The Times.

But both Conservative and Labour officials now believe Mr Sunak’s party has a decent chance of hanging on to Nadine Dorries’ Mid Bedfordshire seat despite a big slump in the Tory voter.

The Tories have held Mid Bedfordshire since 1931 and Ms Dorries held on to it in 2019 by 24,000 votes over second-placed Labour.

Polling guru Sir John Curtice said: “We can’t discount the possibility that the Tories hang on to both of them” – but said a 20-point vote swing away from the party would mean “they are in trouble”.

“We may discover it’s a 19 percent swing and the Tories just hang on. That would not indicate any particular rescue for the Tories,” he told Politico. A Lib Dem activist said there was “a really good chance” that the Tories come through the middle and hang on.

Labour and Lib Dems expected to split anti-Tory vote in three-way contest in Mid Bedfordshire (PA)

A leaked Tory memo revealed that the party expects to lose half their vote share at two by-elections. The Tories expect their vote share to be cut from 59 per cent to 29 per cent in Mid Bedfordshire.

But pollsters believe it may be enough to cling on to the “blue wall” seat because of Labour and the Lib Dems splitting the vote. Prof Curtice told The Independent that “it may be that Labour won’t pick it up because of the split vote”.

The two-way Labour-Tory contest in Tamworth appears on a knife-edge. The leaked Conservative memo also predicts the Tories would win between 28 per cent and 33 per cent of the vote in Tamworth.

Mr Sunak’s party is defending a 19,600 majority in the Midlands seat – vacated by Chris Pincher, the former deputy chief whip found to have groped two men.

The Tory candidate for Tamworth Andrew Cooper has apologised for suggesting some parents using food banks could “f*** off”. He told Channel 5 News he was “sorry if” anyone was offended by the flowchart he shared back in 2020.

“Obviously it is not something I would share now in today’s world,” said Mr Cooper. “We obviously mature and have different opinions than we do three years ago.”

Tory Tamworth candidate Andrew Cooper has apologised for food bank comments (Conservative Party)

Sir Keir’s spokesman said: “If we were to win Tamworth and had that swing at a general election, it would mean that the Tories will be down to fewer than 60 seats at the next general election.”

Then PM’s press secretary told reporters that “mid-term by-elections are extremely tough for incumbent governments” but said the Tories were “fighting for every vote”.

Polls in both constituencies will open at 7am on Thursday, with the results likely to be known in the early hours of Friday.

Sir Keir’s party hold at least a double-digit lead over the Tories in the polls. That gap was borne out in a huge by-election win in Selby in July when Labour overturned a blue 20,000 majority on a 21 per cent swing.

Meanwhile, Sir Keir received another boost when the boss of BlackRock, one of the world’s leading financiers, gave his backing – arguing that the Labour leader offers a “measurement of hope” to British politics.

Larry Fink, chairman and chief executive of the major asset manager, told the Wall Street Journal that Sir Keir had shown “real strength” in bringing Labour back to the centre ground.