UK Labour faces Green challenge in Starmer's old seat

Key facts

• A by-election is being held for the Holborn and St Pancras parliamentary seat.
• The seat was vacated by former Prime Minister Keir Starmer.
• The Green Party is challenging Labour's hold on the seat.
• Voters like tech worker Dani Arbid are undecided but welcome Labour's tougher stance on Israel and EU ties.
• Green Party members recently voted to classify Zionism as a form of racism.
• Burnham's government has taken a critical approach towards Israel and banned imports from West Bank settlements.

Prime Minister Andy Burnham's Labour Party is facing a significant electoral test in a by-election for the Holborn and St Pancras seat, a constituency formerly held by Keir Starmer. The vote is seen as a crucial indicator of whether Burnham can win back voters who have shifted their support to the Green Party, particularly due to dissatisfaction with Labour's previous stance on the war in Gaza.

Voters like 38-year-old tech worker Dani Arbid are currently undecided but have expressed appreciation for Burnham's more critical messaging on Israel and his ambitious approach to European Union relations. Arbid noted that the current Labour government appears to be better at understanding public sentiment and believes there is still room for Labour to recover lost ground.

While Nigel Farage's Reform UK poses a broader national challenge to Labour, this specific by-election is primarily a contest between Labour and the Greens. Labour aims to consolidate the left-of-centre vote, while the Greens, led by Zack Polanski, are seeking to maintain the momentum gained from strong local election results in May. Polanski himself is the Green candidate in Holborn and St Pancras, though Labour's Sagal Abdi-Wali is favored to retain the seat for the governing party.

The Green Party's recent conference, where members voted to classify Zionism as a form of racism, has drawn criticism from British Jewish groups, Israel, and some Green lawmakers. Burnham's government, which has adopted a more critical stance on Israel and banned imports from West Bank settlements, has stated that the Greens have "overstepped a line."

Despite this controversy, some local residents, like AI worker Kamran Ahmed, feel that while Polanski could have handled the conference issues better, the Green Party offers fresh thinking that mainstream parties have failed to deliver. Pollster Survation's head, Damian Lyons Lowe, noted that Holborn and St Pancras is a top target for the Greens and that governments typically perform poorly in by-elections. However, he suggested that Burnham's direct appeals to Green-minded voters and his distinct approach compared to Starmer's leadership present a challenge for the Green Party.