Polls close in three by-elections as Labour eye Boris Johnson’s old seat – live

Senior Tory Sir Robert Buckland said it will be “a tough night for the government” and the Conservatives will need to “reflect” on the results.

The former justice secretary said losing all three seats is “highly likely” but claimed there is “no real enthusiasm” for opposition parties.

“Of course, results like that will be of concern,” he told Sky News.

He added: “Governments lose by elections… this is a fact of life. However, what it means is that we can’t be complacent.

“We have to reflect on what we’re being told. And we have to respond appropriately. The way we respond is by sticking to the plan.”

It is going down to the wire in Uxbridge and South Ruislip … where a recount has been called.

After totalling the votes for all the candidates, the Tories and Labour were so close the votes are having to be recounted.

A very happy looking Labour MP said the Liberal Democrats’ performance in Somerton and Frome shows voters are “fed up” with the Tories, reports my colleague Archie Mitchell.

Darren Jones said the early declaration of victory from the Lib Dems showed voters had sent a “very clear message” to the government that it is “time for change”.

The Liberal Democrats claim to have “romped home” in the Somerset seat.

Mr Jones told Sky News: “That shows that in areas where there were very significant conservative majorities in the last election, the public are fed up to the back teeth of the Conservative government in Westminster and want to send a very clear message that it’s time for change.

“That will reduce the Tory majority in any Westminster election for the whole country. And so that’s welcome.”

Officials at the Selby and Ainsty by-election have just announced a turnout of 44.77 per cent, with some 35,886 ballots included in the count.

That compares to a turnout of 72 per cent in 2019.

Tory MP Andrew Jones is in Selby and Ainsty, and has said the contest will be “very close”.

He blamed the resignation of Boris Johnson loyalist Nigel Adams, who quit after not being given a peerage, as “the reason it will be very close”.

“Nigel’s resignation has been a source of some disappointment, and added some anger in some cases,” Mr Jones said.

Mr Jones told Sky News: “This is a difficult time that we have had plague, we’ve had war. These are huge factors which are affecting not just this country, but right across the world.

“They want their local champion to be speaking up for them, and they are not quite sure why he’s not doing that now.”

But even if the Tories lose, Mr Jones insisted it is “midterm stuff” and midterm by-elections are particularly difficult for long-standing governments.

Gary Robson, aged 70, took his dog Cookie to the polling station in Selby today, and suggested the timing of today’s by-election offered voters the chance to ultimately deal multiple parties a blow.

“You can vote somebody new in this time and in 12 months time can vote them out if they don’t do what you want them to do. So it’s a bloody nose for both lots, then,” the retiree told The Independent.

Speaking with disdain for outgoing Tory MP Nigel Adams, Mr Robson said: “He did nothing for Selby – nothing … I get the impression that he was in it for his own wellbeing and when he didn’t get an honour in the old PM’s list, he went.”

Asked about the big issues in this ballot, the retiree cited Mr Adams’ departure and the Tories’ failure to crack down on cross-Channel migration, adding: “I’m sick of the fact that umpteen prime ministers – all for the Conservatives – have said they were going to do this, that, the other, and did none of it.”

The Uxbridge and South Ruislip by-election is Howling Laud Hope’s 32nd shot at securing a Parliamentary seat, a UK record.

Asked by The Independent whether the 32nd time is the charm, an optimistic Mr Hope said: “Who knows.”

Labour’s shadow justice secretary Steve Reed has claimed the Tory candidate in Uxbridge is “ashamed of the record of his own party”, reports my colleague Archie Mitchell.

Mr Reed said Steve Tuckwell, who is running to replace Boris Johnson for the Conservatives, has tried to “distance himself” from the party. There has been a notable lack of mentions of the Conservatives, Rishi Sunak or Mr Johnson on Mr Tuckwell’s campaign material.

Mr Reed told reporters: “What people are talking about, on their own doorsteps up and down the country is the cost of living.

“Yet we have the representative of the governing party in a by-election who has absolutely nothing to say about any of that and is also running away from his own party branding.”

Mr Reed said campaigning has “felt very positive” and Labour is “in with a chance” of winning the seat. “This was the seat that said Boris Johnson as the Conservative prime minister to parliament,” he said.

Mr Reed added: “If you had said to me then that three and a half years later, we would be back in Uxbridge and Labour was even in with a chance of taking the seat, I would have thought you were bonkers.”

The youngest candidate in the race in Selby and Ainsty told The Independent that he had already achieved his objectives in the by-election.

Tyler Wilson-Kerr, a 24-year-old parish councillor and aerospace engineer who is standing as an independent candidate, said: “I’ve achieved my objectives, which were to politicise the closure of 24-hour services at Selby War Memorial Hospital.

“Since 2017, it’s been open only 12 hours a day. The next closest hospital is in York, Leeds or Wakefield, and because these villages are very rural, I raise the question of how many people have passed away while getting to these far-away hospitals when there’s one just on the doorstep.

“So even though [Labour and the Tories] have been saying things about ‘we’re going to prioritise the NHS, we’re going to get a new diagnostic unit’ – fundamentally, you need the hospital to be open.

Satisfied that the issue is “now in the Overton window”, he continued: “I don’t like this politics of division and divide and conquer that you see from both parties.

“I think it’s a consequence of the electoral system but you watch PMQs and it’s just loggerheads, nonsense and waffle while real people suffer. Reopen 24-hour service at Selby war memorial hospital.”

Laurence Fox, the former Lewis actor, who has gone on to set up the Reclaim Party, said a “good night for me is making sure the Conservatives lose”, reports Archie Mitchell from the count in Uxbridge.

Mr Fox told The Independent: “For me, getting enough votes for Labour to beat the Conservatives would be great. They deserve to lose because they are not Conservatives.

“Labour are not Labour either, they are just one party, but some time in opposition for the Conservatives might make them be Conservatives.

“And if Labour spent some time in power they might have to actually do what they were meant to do and help working people – instead of woking off everywhere.”

Mr Fox insisted he did not want to exist as a politician, but felt the need to pile pressure on the major parties.