UK general election results 2019

The Conservative party and Boris Johnson were the clear victors in the United Kingdom's general election of 2019, winning 365 seats out of 650, earning them a majority of 80 seats in the House of Commons. The Conservative party's main rivals, the Labour Party, suffered their worst defeat since 1935, after seeing their share of the vote decline by 7.8 percent. Overall, the Labour Party lost 59 seats across the whole country, with historic losses recorded in the party's traditional heartlands of Northern England.

Johnson's downfall

Despite winning a large majority in this general election, Boris Johnson's popularity fell significantly throughout his time as Prime Minister. From the middle of 2021 onwards, the approval rating of his government declined dramatically. The start of this downturn began when Johnson, came under scrutiny for breaking lockdown rules at the height of COVID-19 lockdowns. Due to the nature of the violations, which concerned celebratory social gatherings at Downing Street, the scandal became known as 'Partygate. Johnson was ultimately served a fixed-penalty notice for breaking lockdown rules, and despite surviving a vote of no-confidence in his leadership in June 2022, his authority was badly shaken.

Truss and Sunak struggle to steady the ship

A series of damaging ministerial resignations between July 5-7, 2022 forced Johnson's hand, and he resigned on July 7, 2022, remaining as Prime Minister until the Conservative party elected the ill-fated Liz Truss as his replacement in September 2022. Even by post-Brexit standards, Truss' time in office was very brief. Just 45 days after becoming Prime Minister, Truss resigned. The economic damage unleashed by her mini-budget was too severe for her to continue. In her place stepped Rishi Sunak, who became the third Prime Minister of 2022, and the fifth since the Brexit vote of 2016. Although Sunak restored a degree of political stability to after Truss, he has failed to improve the Conservative's poor polling position as the country gears up for an election in 2024 or 2025.