Labour’s Steve Rotheram re-elected as Liverpool City Region metro mayor

Steve Rotheram has been re-elected as Liverpool City Region metro mayor and won the contest on first preferences as 198,726 votes – an overall share of 58.2% – were cast for the Labour incumbent.

Conservative challenger Jade Marsden placed second in the race, securing 66,702 votes, while Green Gary Cargill ranked third after receiving 40,211 first preferences. Lib Dem David Newman came last with 35,049 votes.

The share of votes won by Rotheram specifically in the city of Liverpool was 66%, which is 27.5 percentage points more than the first preferences cast for Joanne Anderson, elected as Liverpool city mayor on Friday.

The solid win for the three-year term means the Liverpool City Region mayor has outperformed the Labour Party across the region, suggesting that he is personally popular and has not been affected by recent scandals.

Commenting on his victory, he said:  “The Labour Party is not just a passing vehicle to jump on to promote a personal ideology. The Labour Party is not a football to be kicked around by transient factions.”

A former bricklayer, Rotheram was the Labour MP for Liverpool Walton from 2010 until he was elected as Liverpool’s metro mayor in 2017, when he won on the first round with a 59.3% share of the vote.

Liverpool City Council was subject to a damning report earlier this year, which found serious issues in the workings of the council led by Joe Anderson, who was arrested in December 2020 over allegations he denies.

Government minister Robert Jenrick was clear when addressing the contents of the Max Caller report that neither Rotheram nor the combined authority were implicated in any wrongdoing identified by it.

The mayor unveiled five key promises in his re-election campaign, focusing on a £150m Covid recovery fund, improving public transport and doubling the number of green jobs to help tackle the climate crisis.

The Labour win in Liverpool follows news of the historic defeat for the party in the by-election in Hartlepool on Friday, where the party lost the seat for the first time since its creation in 1974 to the Conservative challenger.

Results for the local elections began to emerge on Friday morning. The party has lost four English councils so far and the Tories have gained seven. Labour held the Doncaster mayoralty as Ros Jones was re-elected.

Labour suffered a heavy defeat in the Tees Valley mayoral election as the incumbent Conservative Ben Houchen was re-elected by a landslide 73% of the vote. It followed his shock win in 2017 in the area considered a ‘Labour heartland’.