On 4 July, the United Kingdom held a general election in which 650 seats for the House of Commons, the lower parliamentary house, were contested. The Labour Party, led by Keir Starmer, won a majority of 411 seats with a vote share of 33.7 per cent. The Conservative Party, led by incumbent Prime Minister Rishi Sunak, secured 23.7 per cent of the vote and only 121 seats, lower than in any general election since 1832, according to the House of Commons Library. The Liberal Democrats became the third largest party with 72 seats and a share of 12.2 per cent of the vote. Voter turnout was 59.8 per cent, a notable drop compared to the turnout of 67.3 per cent in the 2019 general election. A record of 263 women MPs were elected (40 per cent of total), an increase from 226 women (34.8 per cent) in the previous legislature.

Sources: House of Commons, Reuters, BBC

On 29 July, children attending a Taylor Swift-themed dance class were attacked in Southport, northern England. Three young girls were killed, and eight more children and two adults were injured. After a peaceful vigil for the victims, a violent riot broke out near the scene of the attack, resulting in injuries to nearly 40 police officers. The 17-year-old boy arrested in connection with the knife attack at the dance class was initially not named due to his age. Online dis- and misinformation circulated about the name and identity of the attacker, with some falsely claiming the perpetrator was a Muslim asylum-seeker. Riots marked by extremist violence broke out across the UK, including the vandalisation of businesses owned by ethnic and religious minorities and attacks on hotels housing migrants. The government responded with a crackdown, leading to the arrest of multiple rioters.

Sources: New York Times, The Loop, BBC, Merseyside Police, The Guardian, ECRE

On 22 April, Parliament approved a controversial bill allowing the UK government to send asylum-seekers to Rwanda for their asylum claims to be heard, even after the Supreme Court ruled the scheme to be unlawful in November 2023. Migrants who have their claims rejected are not provided recourse to return to the UK. The law compels UK courts to consider Rwanda a safe country for the purposes of relocating migrants and prevents legal challenges from delaying a person’s removal to Rwanda on the grounds that the country may be unsafe. Prime Minister Rishi Sunak, who spearheaded the bill, says it is designed to deter irregular migration, discourage migrants from making dangerous crossings and prevent exploitation of migrants by criminal gangs. The law has been widely criticized, including by international NGO Amnesty International, who say the legislation weakens legal protections for vulnerable people, and the Council of Europe Commissioner for Human Rights, who claims it infringes on judicial independence and the ability of courts to independently scrutinize the issues brought before them. The government has indicated the scheme will be operationalized within the next 10-12 weeks.

Sources: International IDEA, Amnesty International, UN News, BBC, UK Home Office (1), UK Home Office (2), Council of Europe, UK Parliament

With the enactment of the Hate Crime and Public Order Act on 1 April, Scotland expanded protections for victims of hate crimes. The amendments create a new offence of “threatening or abusive” behaviour which is intended to stir up hatred on the basis of age, disability, religion, gender identity, or sexual orientation (hate crimes concerning race are already in place). The entry into force of the law (first passed by members of the Scottish Parliament in 2021) has been delayed over debates of its treatment of cases of misogyny, as well as calls, particularly from religious and cultural groups, to reinforce freedom of speech provisions. Amendments have since been passed seeking to ensure the hate crime law is aligned with Article 10 of the European Convention of Human Rights, which requires a high threshold for criminality in the new offenses.  Critics, ranging from conservative celebrities to anti-trans rights activists, continue to express concerns about the law’s potential impacts on freedom of speech despite the amendments. The Scottish Police Federation has stated that they have not received enough training to deal with the complexity of the law.

Sources: The Guardian (1), The Guardian (2), Hate Crime and Public Order Act (2021), The Scottish Parliament, Scottish Government (1), Scottish Government (2)

On 16 January, an estimated 3.5 million British citizens living abroad became eligible to vote in parliamentary elections and referenda in the UK. Amendments to the Representation of the People Act, together with provisions on overseas voting in the Elections Act (passed in 2022), paved the way for the abolishment of a rule that citizens could only be registered to vote for 15 years after leaving the UK. The changes allow any citizen abroad who has previously lived in, or been registered to vote, in the UK to register as an overseas voter. The Electoral Commission has launched a campaign to raise awareness of the changes and to encourage the newly eligible UK citizens abroad to register to vote. An estimated 233,000 overseas voters were registered to vote in the 2019 general elections. UK electoral law allows any registered voter to donate to political parties and campaigners in the UK.

Sources: UK Parliament (1), UK Parliament (2), The Guardian, UK Electoral Commission (1), UK Electoral Commission (2), BBC, UK Government (1), UK Government (2), UK Parliament (3)