Shock and jubilation rippled through Birmingham’s International Conference Centre on Saturday night as a high-stakes race for England’s second largest mayoralty culminated in a crushing loss for the ruling Conservatives.
Andy Street, incumbent West Midlands mayor and former managing director of John Lewis, lost his position to Labour by a hair’s breadth after a tense recount.
Labour’s candidate, accountant Richard Parker, ultimately beat Street by 1,508 votes, a margin of just 0.3 per cent.
For Sunak, the result represented a brutal conclusion to a grim set of local and mayoral election results over the previous two days, while for Street it cut short seven years of attempts to usher investment and devolution into the country’s second-biggest city.
While Street’s performance had been seen as a crucial test for Sunak, his campaign was deliberately pitched at arm’s length from a party he had come to criticise over recent months.
Sunak’s decision to cancel the northern leg of HS2 during last October’s Conservative party conference prompted outrage from Street, who held a press conference urging a rethink on the eve of the announcement and at one point appeared to be on the verge of leaving the party.
“He was given every excuse to become an independent, and in such a way that would have almost guaranteed the re-election he has now been denied,” said Henri Murison, chief executive of the Northern Powerhouse Partnership business lobby group, which later worked alongside Street to draw up an alternative to the scrapped line.
Street also worked closely with Greater Manchester’s Labour mayor Andy Burnham on the HS2 alternative, which is being considered by the government.
After the HS2 row died down, Street again criticised Sunak in March, after the prime minister warned “mob rule” was descending on British streets during the Gaza protests. Street said the comments did not “fit with my world view”.
“I am absolutely determined that as the most diverse place in Britain . . . [the West Midlands] has to be the most tolerant place where every faith coexists,” he told the Financial Times.
Street’s tenure primarily focused on inward investment and further devolved powers, both of which he successfully secured from the government after he was first elected in 2017.
Last year’s “trailblazer” devolution deal, providing the mayor with more powers over skills, housing and transport, as well as more spending flexibility, had been seen as particularly significant by regional growth experts.
“His legacy is a booming Birmingham, underpinned by confidence he helped build in it,” said Murison.
Street “remained a businessman to his core” throughout his two mayoral terms, he added.
Andy Westwood, professor of government practice at the University of Manchester and originally from the West Midlands, agreed that Street had “obviously understood business and the importance of business investment”, while also grasping the importance of “infrastructure, skills and research and development” as levers for regional growth.
He had also built up a new institution — the area’s combined authority — “from scratch”, he said. “All of this will be helpful to build on and learn from by his successor.”
Street’s campaign focused on his own delivery record, eschewing Conservative party branding.
In April he told the Financial Times that colleagues in Westminster should abandon culture wars on topics such as net zero and instead focus on getting things done.
“It’s not about philosophy and posturing, it’s about getting delivery on the ground,” he said.
However the message did not quite persuade West Midlands voters and a modest swing towards Labour took his rival to victory.
Speaking afterwards Street said that he was “devastated” by the loss, but refused to blame his party for it and said he was “ultimately responsible” for a campaign that had failed to convince enough voters.
A “modern, inclusive” form of Conservatism had “come within an ace” of winning, he added.
He hoped to bestow upon Parker an institution and a role to which young people could aspire, he said. “In a sense, I can have done no more than that,” he added.
Despite Labour’s win, one element of the West Midlands result will fuel jitters among the party’s strategists and MPs.
Independent candidate Akhmed Yakoob secured 20 per cent of the vote in Birmingham, the area’s most populous authority with a substantial Muslim community, amid anger about Labour’s position on the Gaza conflict. It follows the party’s loss of Oldham council on Thursday, alongside a smattering of seat losses in areas of Bolton, Bradford, Manchester and Newcastle with large Muslim populations.
Speaking to the local news outlet Birmingham Live ahead of the results, Birmingham Yardley MP Jess Phillips, who resigned from the party’s front bench last year after Labour leader Keir Starmer refused to call for a ceasefire in Gaza, said that if voters were expressing anger over the conflict, her party would need to take heed.
“If we don’t listen . . . then we will get what we deserve,” she said.
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