Counting will begin after polling stations close at 10pm tonight
Polls have opened in the Holborn and St Pancras by-election as candidates battle to replace Sir Keir Starmer as the MP for the north London constituency.
The seat has been a Labour stronghold for 32 years, but dozens of candidates are standing for election, with the Green Party in particular hoping to break the decades-long streak as Zack Polanski eyes a seat in the House of Commons.
It could be a defining moment for Mr Polanski’s leadership of the party, which has seen a surge in membership and record-breaking results in the May 2026 local elections, gaining more than 440 councillors and gaining control of five councils.
However, the by-election has fallen on an intense week for the Green Party, after members passed a controversial motion at their conference in Brighton asserting that “Zionism is racism”.
Mr Polanski, who abstained on the vote, later said that he will “not accept any exclusion, or refusal to engage with anyone, because of the religious or communal body they are part of”.
Labour’s candidate, local council leader Sagal Abdi-Wali, is hoping to hold the seat after the former prime minister announced he was resigning as an MP last month.
Ms Abdi-Wali has been given an enthusiastic endorsement by Andy Burnham, who said: “Today, hope can win. But only if you vote for it. I have no doubt that Sagal Abdi-Wali will make a brilliant local MP for Holborn and St Pancras.
“This area gave Sagal a home when she arrived here as a refugee in the 1990s. Camden gave Sagal and her family hope. Now she wants to give that back to the communities that have always been there for her.
“It’s hard to think of someone more committed to their local area and the care of people than Sagal.”
There are 13 other candidates in the by-election, including the Conservatives’ Ewan Cameron, Reform UK’s Peter Newman and the Liberal Democrats’ Patrick Thomas Stillman.
Also running is George Galloway of the Workers Party of Britain, despite living overseas in what he describes as “self-exile”.
In 2024, Sir Keir won the Holborn and St Pancras seat in 2024 with 48.9 per cent of the vote (18,884 votes), with independent Andrew Feinstein as runner-up on 18.9 per cent (7,312 votes) and the Greens in third with 10.4 per cent of the vote (4,030 votes).
The count will begin after polling stations close at 10pm on Thursday.
The result of by-elections usually are announced in the early hours of the morning the following day.
In 2024, the result in the general election vote in Holborn and St Pancras was announced at 4.15am.
An exit poll is a sample survey of people who have just voted at a polling station, and they are usually done for general elections.
The purpose is to gain an early indication as to how an election has turned out, as in many elections the actual result may take many hours to count.
By-elections do not usually have exit polls conducted, so one is not expected for Holborn and St Pancras today.
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