A previous Labour councillor who left the party in protest in 2022 has been re-elected to his old seat in the West London borough of Hounslow in a significant rebuff to Sir Keir Starmer’s ‘Continuity Tories’ Labour government.

A by-election in Hounslow’s Syon and Brentford Lock ward on March 6th saw the former Labour council cabinet member Theo Dennison win 615 votes – a 33.5% share of the poll – as an Independent candidate, beating the Labour party on 603 votes, and with the Green Party third on 218, ahead of the Tories (150), Reform (149), and the Liberal Democrats (102).

Labour’s vote fell from 1,463 in the last election in May 2022 (37.8%) in which Theo, also standing then as an Independent after twelve years as a councillor in the area, had come in at second place with 822 votes (21.2%). 

No matter how it will be spun by Labour, this is a symptomatic defeat.  No wonder the government was so keen to cancel elections in nine councils due to go to polls on May 1st!  And the Tory councillors in those authorities too, who backed Labour in this undemocratic act.  In Hounslow the Tory vote also fell, from 14.9% in 2022 to 8.2% now.