Labour MP Mike Amesbury To Stand Down And Trigger By-Election
Mike Amesbury has been MP for Runcorn and Helsby since 2017 (Alamy)
1 min read
Labour MP Mike Amesbury has announced he will stand down as an MP "as soon as possible" and trigger the first by-election since Labour got into government last July.
Amesbury pleaded guilty in January to assaulting 45-year-old Paul Fellows in a Cheshire street, after he was filmed attacking Fellows and warning him that " you won't threaten your MP again will you?"
He became an independent MP after losing the Labour whip as a result of the incident. However, the MP avoided jail after winning an appeal against his 10-week prison sentence.
Amesbury has been the MP for Runcorn and Helsby since 2017, and will now begin the "statutory process" of resigning as an MP "as soon as possible".
A by-election will therefore be held in his seat, where Reform UK came second in the 2024 general election. While Amesbury won 22,358 votes, the Reform candidate won 7,662.
The contest could be the first major electoral test for Keir Starmer's Labour government, and a measure of whether Reform has gained significant popularity since last summer.
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