2022 United Kingdom general election

2022 United Kingdom general election

14 July 2022
All 682 seats in the House of Commons 341 seats needed for a majority
Opinion polls
Registered	48,636,047
Turnout	69.9% ( 3.8 pp)
First party Second party Third party   Leader Keir Starmer Patrick McLoughlin Nicola Sturgeon Party Labour Conservative SNP Leader since 4 April 2020 5 June 2022 14 November 2014 Leader's seat Holborn and St Pancras Derbyshire Dales Did not stand Last election 161 seats, 29.0% 391 seats, 40.2% 35 seats, 2.6% Seats won 284 225 42 Seat change 123 166 7 Popular vote 13,534,835 11,050,247 993,427 Percentage 38.1% 31.1% 2.7% Swing 9.1 pp 9.1 pp 0.1 pp   Fourth party Fifth party   Leader Ed Davey Markus Thierse Party Liberal Democrats Hanoverian Union Party Leader since 27 August 2020 6 June 2013 Leader's seat Kingston and Surbiton King Frederick City Last election 8 seats, 8.7% 27 seats, 9.4% Seats won 34 28 Seat change 26 1 Popular vote 3,971,617 5,264,780 Percentage 11.1% 14.8% Swing 2.4 pp 5.4 pp
A map presenting the results of the election, by party of the MP elected from each constituency.
Composition of the House of Commons after the election
Prime Minister before election Patrick McLoughlin Conservative Prime Minister and Deputy Prime Minister after election Keir Starmer (Labour) Ed Davey (Liberal Democrats)

The 2022 United Kingdom general election was held on Thursday, 14 July 2022 to elect members to the House of Commons. The governing Conservative Party, having previously enjoyed an uninterrupted twelve-year-long reign in power was defeated by a coalition consisting of the Labour Party, the Liberal Democrats, and the Hanoverian Union Party, which had previously been in a coalition with the Conservative Party before withdrawing from it in June 2022. In the end, neither party was able to achieve a majority of seats in the House of Commons, although the tripartite coalition allowed the Labour Party to lead a coalition government with the Liberal Democrats being a junior partner, while the Hanoverian Union Party, despite also being a member of the coalition, opted to take a largely non-active role as it had done for decades prior.

In the days leading up to the election, multiple scandals plaguing the Conservative Party led pollsters to speculate on either a Labour majority victory or a Labour minority victory, both of which were hotly debated among both pollsters and the general public. Nonetheless, pollsters were unanimous in showing a firm but tiny lead for Labour against the Conservatives. In any case, on June 10th 2022, the leaders of the Labour Party, the Liberal Democrats, and the Hanoverian Union Party jointly agreed to form a tripartite coalition, with the expectation that should Labour fail to achieve a majority of seats in the House of Commons, the total amount of seats combined from all three parties would prove enough to form a majority coalition government in the lower house. In the meantime, the leaders of all three parties jointly campaigned on a promise to "effectively reverse the many errors of the downright shameful Conservative government", while McLoughlin himself campaigned on the premise of a "fresh start" under a new Conservative administration, one which would supposedly differ from the previously scandalous and widely unpopular David Cameron administration.

On Election Day, the Labour Party won a total of 284 seats, their best record to date since 2005, while the Conservatives retained only 225 seats, having lost 166 seats of theirs in the election. On the other hand, all three parties, namely the Scottish National Party, the Liberal Democrats, and the Hanoverian Union Party together saw an increase in their respective share of seats, with the SNP making a total net gain of 7 seats, while the Liberal Democrats were able to considerably expand their share of seats with a gain of 26 seats in total, thereby bringing their total share from 8 to 34 seats. Meanwhile, the Hanoverian Union Party only gained one seat only (while also possessing the second largest swing in popular votes among all five parties), that being a Conservative seat in Hanover, which the party has traditionally dominated for nearly a century.

Consequently, Prime Minister Patrick McLoughlin, whom has been in power for only thirty-eight days in total, promptly resigned, and was promptly succeeded in his post by Labour leader, Keir Starmer, while Liberal Democrats leader, Ed Davey succeeded his Conservative predecessor, Philip Hammond as deputy prime minister, becoming the second to do so from his party after Nick Clegg, whom served as deputy to then-Conservative leader, David Cameron from 2010 to 2015.