Pressure on Boris Johnson after U.K. Tories suffer by-election upset
The Hindu
Against this backdrop, supporters and opponents are questioning Mr. Johnson’s handling of the pandemic
U.K. Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s Conservative Party has suffered a stunning defeat in a parliamentary by-election that was viewed as a referendum on his government amid weeks of scandal and soaring COVID-19 infections.
Liberal Democrat Helen Morgan overturned a Conservative majority of almost 23,000 votes from the last election to win Thursday’s contest in North Shropshire, a rural area of northwest England that has been represented by a Conservative almost continuously since 1832. The election was called after the former Conservative member of Parliament resigned amid a corruption scandal.
The result will heap pressure on Mr. Johnson just two years after he was reelected with a seemingly unassailable 80-seat majority in the British Parliament. But his authority has been dented in recent weeks by allegations that he and his staff attended Christmas parties last year while the country was in lockdown, efforts to shield an ally from allegations of illegal lobbying and suggestions that he improperly accepted donations to fund the lavish refurbishment of his official residence.