British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak says the British people have “delivered a sobering verdict,” and the Labour Party has won the election.

Sunak, who held onto his seat in North Yorkshire, told those gathered: “The Labour party has won this general election.”

With more than half of the 650 seats declared so far, Labour is emerging way ahead of other parties with at least 250 seats.

The governing Conservatives have 44 seats, while the left-of-center Liberal Democrats have won 32 seats.

The hard-right, anti-immigration Reform UK has won 4 seats so far.

The Scottish National Party has four seats, while the Green Party has 1 seat.

While the Labour Party appears headed for a landslide U.K. election victory, it seems clear that it has suffered in areas with big Muslim communities over its stance on the conflict in Gaza.

A prominent Labour member, Jonathan Ashworth, lost his Leicester South seat in central England to an independent candidate who had Gaza at the heart of his campaign.

Ashworth, who was expected to be appointed to the Cabinet, lost around 20,000 votes when compared to the election of 2019.

Even Labour leader Keir Starmer saw his majority in his Holborn and St. Pancras seat in north London reduced, with more than 7,000 votes going to a pro-Gaza candidate.

After the Oct. 7 attacks on Israel by Hamas militants, Starmer took a strongly pro-Israel stance and maintained it even as the death toll in Gaza swelled. Many Muslims who had been traditional Labour voters were aghast and have clearly turned to other candidates.

Jeremy Corbyn, who led the Labour Party into the general elections of 2017 and 2019, has held onto his seat in north London — but this time as an independent.

Corbyn, who had been suspended from Labour following a row over antisemitism, decided to stand as an independent candidate in the Islington North constituency he has represented since 1983.

Corbyn won the seat by nearly 7,000 votes over his Labour opponent. Corbyn had won the seat by more than 26,000 votes at the last election.

Nigel Farage, the leader of the hard-right Reform UK party, has been elected to Parliament.

Farage won the contest in the seaside town of Clacton-on-Sea, becoming a lawmaker at his eighth try after seven failed election attempts.

Partial results show the anti-immigration Reform, successor to the Brexit Party, has taken votes from both the Conservatives and Labour.

Farage said the party was “going to come second in hundreds of constituencies.” It is not yet clear how many seats Reform will win.

He said there is a “massive gap” in the right of British politics, and it was his job to fill it.

“My plan is to build a mass national movement over the course of the next few years,” he said.

U.K. Defense Secretary Grant Shapps, long a key figure in the Conservative Party, has lost his seat in the general election.

Shapps lost his contest for Welwyn Hatfield, a seat north of London, by nearly 4,000 votes, or by 8 percentage points to his Labour Party opponent Andrew Lewin.

Shapps, 55, was widely considered to be the government’s most trusted media performers over many years and had been tipped as a potential Conservative leadership candidate to replace Prime Minister Rishi Sunak.

Labour leader Keir Starmer says “voters have spoken and they are ready for change” as an exit poll points to a landslide win for his party.

Starmer spoke as he won his seat in north London but on a much-reduced majority.

Addressing the audience, he spoke of the need to return politics to “public service” and the need for “change.”

He thanked voters for electing him to serve “my home, where my kids have grown up, where my wife was born.”

“It all starts with you. Change begins in this community,” he said. “You have voted, it is now time for us to deliver.”

Reform U.K., the recently formed anti-immigration party, has won its first seat in the general election.

Lee Anderson, the former Conservative deputy chairman who defected to Reform a few months ago, held onto his seat in Ashfield in central England with 43% of the vote.

Reform has posed a serious headache to the governing Conservatives, luring many previously staunch Tory voters with its promises to cut immigration.

The exit poll suggested that the party, which is led by divisive right-wing politician Nigel Farage, could win up to 13 seats in the 650-seat House of Commons.

Keir Starmer, the leader of the Labour Party who is set to become prime minister if Britain’s exit poll is correct, has arrived at a counting center for his constituency in north London.

Starmer arrived with his wife to rapturous applause from supporters.

Starmer didn’t make any comments but was more than happy to put himself up for selfies.

The independent candidate is hoping to unseat Prime Minister Rishi Sunak in his seat of Richmond and North Allerton.

The self-described intergalactic space warrior is a satirical character created by comedian David Harvey. He has said his ambition was to conquer “the entire omniverse.” He also said he hoped that his campaign will raise a smile and show that “democracy is alive”.

“There’s something wonderful that in the year of 2024 when so many countries are going to the polls and democracy is under threat like never before, it’s still possible to do what I do,” he said in a recent interview.

Labour’s Rachel Reeves, who is set to become the first female Treasury chief if her party wins the U.K. election, said she is “under no illusions” about the scale of the challenge she will face.

“The severity of the inheritance from the Conservatives is truly awful,” she told Sky News.

Reeves noted that the U.K.’s debt burden is running at 100% of the country’s national income and the tax burden at a seven-decade high.

She said she “can’t promise to turn everything around straight away.”

Reeves said the driving mission of an incoming Labour government is to kickstart economic growth.

The Conservative Party has lost the first seat it was defending in the U.K. general election.

Robert Buckland, a former justice minister, lost his Swindon South seat in central England after his vote slumped by 25% compared with the last election 2019. Labour’s Heidi Alexander won the seat, returning to Parliament after she resigned in 2018 to take up a position with the mayor of London.

Voting in the U.K. is done the old-school way — no voting machines are used. Instead, voters put a pencil to paper, and all ballot papers are counted manually.

After ballot boxes are opened, the ballot papers in the box are mixed with postal vote ballot papers and the counting begins at counting centers across the U.K.

Several dozen seats are expected to be declared from now until around 0100GMT to 0200GMT – including Labour leader Keir Starmer’s London seat, Holborn and St. Pancras.

From 0200GMT onwards will be the busiest part of the night, with more than 200 seats expected to be declared.

By around 0300GMT, enough results should be known to suggest which party is on course to win.

A leading political analyst says British voters will see a major change in political atmosphere if Labour wins the election.

Anand Menon, professor of European Politics and Foreign Affairs at King’s College London, said the last few years under the Conservatives had been “politics as pantomime. A very unstable Conservative Party with lots of infighting, with lots of ministerial churn, with no stability.

“I think we’re going to have to get used again to relatively stable government, with ministers staying in power for quite a long time, and with government being able to think beyond the very short term as to medium term objectives,” Menon said.

A Labour Party candidate has won the first U.K. seat to report its result in the general election.

Bridget Phillipson, who is Labour’s education spokesperson, won with a majority of 7,169 in the Houghton and Sunderland South seat in the northeast of England from the second-placed candidate.

That’s more than double the majority she won last time the seat was contested in 2019.

The candidate from the recently formed, anti-immigration Reform UK Party came second, pushing the candidate from the governing Conservative Party into third.

Phillipson said the result represented a vote for “hope and unity, not decline and division.”

With an exit poll suggesting that Britain’s Labour Party is set to win a huge majority, some in Britain are recalling the election results of 1997, when Tony Blair led Labour to a landslide victory.

In 1997, the Labour Party had been out of power for longer than it has been now — 18 years compared to the current 14.

So it was quite a turnaround when Labour, under the leadership of the youthful Blair, won the May 1, 1997 general election decisively. “New Labour, New Britain” was the party’s slogan, and “Things can only get better” by D-ream was its theme song.

Under Blair, Labour won a majority of 179 seats, even bigger than the party’s victory over Winston Churchill’s Conservatives soon after the defeat of Nazi Germany in 1945.

▶ Read more on how Tony Blair and Labour won in 1997. You can also take a look at other big election moments after World War II, like Margaret Thatcher’s win and Winston Churchill’s defeat.

Leading members of Britain’s main political parties are reacting to the exit poll suggesting the opposition Labour Party winning a landslide victory and returning to power for the first time since 2010.

Labour’s deputy leader, Angela Rayner, told Sky News that the Conservatives are getting punished by voters for “14 years of the chaos and the scandals and the decline.”

Labour’s national campaign chief, Pat McFadden, said the transformation of his party since its poor showing in the 2019 election has been “remarkable.”

Meanwhile, Ruth Davidson, the former leader of the Scottish Conservatives, said the exit poll pointed to a “massacre” for the party.

The projection suggests that the Conservatives will end up with its lowest number of seats in the House of Commons since 1906.

The exit poll suggests that the opposition Labour Party is on course to win 410 of the House of Commons’ 650 seats.

The Conservatives are set for 131 seats — the lowest number of Conservative lawmakers on record.

The exit poll also forecasts the left-of-center Liberal Democrats will take 61 seats, and the right-wing, anti-immigration Reform UK is predicted to take 13. The Green Party is expected to take 2.

The Scottish National Party, SNP, are expected to secure 10 seats.

Britain’s exit poll is conducted by asking thousands of people at over 100 polling stations to privately fill out a replica ballot showing how they have voted.

Researchers go back to the same polling stations in each national election and compare the results over time. The exit poll usually provides a reliable — though not exact — projection of the final result.

At 10 p.m. local time (2100GMT), polls across the U.K. will close — and exit poll results will be broadcast on British news channels moments later.

Britain’s exit poll is conducted by pollster Ipsos and asks people at scores of polling stations to fill out a replica ballot showing how they have voted. It usually provides a reliable — though not exact — projection of the final result.

Here’s a look at the parties, who’s leading them and what they’re promising:

Conservatives

Who’s their leader? Prime Minister Rishi Sunak.How many seats did they win in the last election? 365What are they promising? Delivering a stronger economy and cutting taxes by some 17 billion pounds per year. Increasing public health spending above inflation, and boosting defense spending to 2.5% of GDP by 2030. The party says this will be paid for by savings on tax evasion and slashing welfare spending. The party also pledges to cap immigration numbers and remove some asylum-seekers to Rwanda.

Labour

Who’s their leader? Keir Starmer.How many seats did they win in the last election? 202What are they promising? Promoting “wealth creation,” encouraging investment and improving Britain’s infrastructure like railways under a 10-year infrastructure strategy. Setting up a state-owned clean power company to boost energy security, paid for by a windfall tax on oil and gas giants. Taxing private schools to pay for thousands of new teachers in state schools. Cutting record-high public health waiting times.

Liberal Democrats

Who’s their leader? Ed Davey.How many seats did they win in the last election? 11What are they promising? Improving Britain’s overstretched health and social care systems, including introducing free nursing care at home. Investing in renewable energy and home insulation. Clamping down on sewage-dumping water companies. Lowering the voting age to 16. Rejoining the European Union’s single market.

Reform UK

Who’s their leader? Nigel Farage.How many seats did they win in the last election? None — though the party gained its first lawmaker this year when ex-Conservative Party deputy chair Lee Anderson defected to Reform.What are they promising? Freezing all “nonessential immigration” and barring international students from bringing their dependents with them. Leaving the European Convention on Human Rights so that asylum-seekers can be deported without interventions from rights courts. Scrapping “net zero” goals to reduce greenhouse gas emissions in order to bring down energy bills.

Scottish National Party (SNP)

Who’s their leader? John Swinney.How many seats did they win in the last election? 48What are they promising? Swinney has said that if his party wins a majority of seats in Scotland he will try to open Scottish independence negotiations with the London-based U.K. government. He wants to rejoin the European Union and the European single market. He also called for boosting public health funding, scrapping the U.K.’s Scotland-based nuclear deterrent, and an immediate cease-fire in Gaza.

Green Party

Who’s their leader? Carla Denyer and Adrian Ramsay.How many seats did they win in the last election? 1What are they promising? Phasing out nuclear power and getting the U.K. to net zero by 2040. The Greens have pledged 24 billion pounds a year to insulate homes and 40 billion pounds a year invested in the green economy, to be paid for by a carbon tax, a new wealth tax on the very rich and an income tax hike for millions of higher earners.

▶ Read more about the main players in the 2024 UK election.

One of the significant unknowns in the U.K election is how the turnout will influence the outcome. The number of people who voted won’t be known until after polls close.

The U.K. has 67 million residents and 46 million were registered to vote in the last general election in 2019. Turnout at that time was 67%.

In local elections in May — when Conservatives suffered heavy losses in council seats and mayoral offices — turnout averaged 30%, the Institute for Government, an independent think tank, reported.

Conservatives expressed optimism that reports of high turnout on Thursday could help them overcome polls that have suggested a widespread Labour victory.

On the other hand, with a double-digit lead in the polls ahead of election day, Labour fears supporters will be complacent and won’t vote. They’ve urged their supporters to go to the polling stations and vote.

Nathaniel Dye believes he probably won’t live to see Britain’s next election. But the music teacher diagnosed with stage 4 bowel cancer is doing everything he can to make sure the Labour Party wins this one.

Dismayed by delays in his diagnosis by the National Health Service, the 38-year-old says he feels let down by the Conservative-led government, which health policy experts say has failed to adequately fund the NHS. As a result, he played a central role in the launch of Labour’s election platform earlier this month, going on national television to urge voters to back the party.

“I’ve seen underfunding of the NHS and mismanagement of the NHS cause real problems in the way I’ve been treated,” he told The Associated Press. “And I suppose I consider it the most natural thing in the world to talk to people on a personal level and say, ‘What can we do to improve things?’”

No public service is as central to life in the United Kingdom as the NHS, and it is failing to deliver on its promise to provide free health care to everyone.

The NHS is creaking under the weight of an aging and growing population, years of funding constraints, and fallout from the COVID-19 pandemic. That means people are waiting longer for everything from primary care appointments to elective surgery and cancer treatment.

Some 52% of people were dissatisfied with the NHS last year, 29 percentage points higher than in 2020, according to the British Social Attitudes Survey, conducted annually since 1983.

▶ Read more about the UK’s NHS crisis.

Voters in the north London borough of Islington started to gather even before the polling station opened as the historically Labour Party stronghold tantalizingly considers the possibility of a change in government after 14 years of Conservative rule.

James Erskine, who works in advertising, said he was unable to forgive Conservative austerity policies that he believes have decimated public services, such as the National Health Service. Even so, he wanted to vote for something rather than against something.

“I think nothing has gone well in the last 14 years, and I think it’s really important that the right result happens,’’ he said. “I was even excited that we might get a different opposition to the big two parties. I don’t actually think that will happen, but that would be amazing. I just see this as the potential for a seismic shift, and that’s what I’m hoping for.”

Erskine did not disclose who he voted for.

Since calling for the general election, Prime Minister Sunak has been at pains to repeat a key message on the campaign trail: The economy is turning a corner. Inflation is down. Things are looking up.

That’s not the reality for millions across the United Kingdom who are still feeling the squeeze from high food, energy and housing prices.

The persistent cost-of-living crisis is a top concern for voters in this parliamentary election.

Although inflation has returned to near-normal levels after skyrocketing in recent years, energy bills and items on store shelves still cost more than they did before the pandemic, when they started their steep climb. And while wages are starting to rise, mortgages and rents have soared along with interest rates, taking large chunks out of many household incomes.

▶ Read more about the UK’s economic state and the big issue on voters’ minds.

The British election has gone to the dogs.

If you were watching news coverage of the election in the U.K., you would be forgiven for thinking canines were going to polls. In fact, they were.

Seemingly every news site had a gallery of dogs outside polling stations. Good dogs, patiently waiting for their owners to do their civic duty while the news business fulfilled an obligation of its own to protect the sanctity of elections.

The U.K. has restrictions on what can be reported on election days before the polls close to avoid influencing voters. Unlike the U.S., where there is wall-to-wall coverage and analysis, there is no such reporting in Britain.

They simply report that people are going to the polls, along with photos and footage of the lead candidates entering polling stations. But there is no discussion of their campaign platforms.

Thus, the puppy love.

There was Alfie, a blonde shaggy dog in Chiswick, Arnie a cockapoo wearing a rainbow color bowtie in Liverpool and Tobie the ottherhound in Norfolk. Those hounds were on Sky News.

On the BBC, there was Lucien, a Bernese mountain dog, lying outside Antrobus Village Hall in Cheshire, Pippin, a fox red Labrador, in the Edgware part of London, and Maui, an Old English sheepdog in Wokingham.

Journalists went the extra mile to show that it wasn’t just pooches at polls. They found at least two horses, a cat, a chicken and a giant snake named Neptune.

England’s team base at the European Championship soccer tournament in Germany is a “politics-free zone” on election day, defender John Stones says.

Stones said he had no clue about his teammates’ voting intentions.

“I couldn’t tell you about the other lads. I’m sure it it’ll be something that’ll get brought up tonight, later on, but I couldn’t tell you who they vote for. They keep it close to their chests,” he said.

That’s a stark contrast to France’s players, who have been vocal about a hard-fought parliamentary election campaign at home.

England is preparing for its Euro 2024 quarterfinal match against Switzerland on Saturday.

Britain has become notorious as a place where a casual swim could lead to an extended visit to the toilet, if not the hospital, and a torrent of news on dirty water has spilled into the election.

While not a top campaign issue, it stinks of a larger problem: Britain’s aging infrastructure — from crumbling schools, hospitals and prisons to pothole-riddled streets.

Bad water is decades in the making, tied to the privatization of waterworks under Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher’s Conservative government in 1989 and to fiscal austerity after the 2008 financial crisis that slashed budgets for watchdogs and others.

The British public discovered the extent of the mess during the COVID-19 pandemic as outdoor recreation such as canoeing and wild swimming took off — and reports increased of people getting sick after being in the water.

The sight and smell of feces, toilet paper and other waste in streams and on beaches led to an outcry, along with clean water campaigns by some London newspapers.

▶ Read more about how Britain’s sewage problem became an election issue.

Thousands of doctors in England staged their 11th walkout last week in a long-running dispute with the government over pay and working conditions, disrupting hospital services.

The five-day strike by junior doctors — those in the early years of their careers — shines a spotlight on the troubles besetting the chronically underfunded National Health Service, Britain’s state-run public health system, a topic that is a top concern for voters going to the polls.

▶ Read more about Britain’s doctor strike.

LONDON — Britain is going to the polls Thursday at a time when public dissatisfaction is running high over a host of issues.

From the high cost of living and a stagnating economy to a dysfunctional state health care system and crumbling infrastructure, some disillusioned voters have turned to the populist Reform Party.

Its divisive leader Nigel Farage, who championed Brexit, is drawing growing numbers of Conservative voters with his pledge to “take our country back.”

Opponents have long accused Farage of fanning racist attitudes toward migrants and condemned what they call his scapegoat rhetoric. They say that underfunding of schools, hospitals and housing under governments on the right and left is the problem, not migrants.

Polls show Farage has a comfortable lead in Clacton-on-Sea — a town on England’s southeast coast where many older, white voters used to staunchly support the governing Conservatives.

It’s unclear how much impact his party will have in capturing seats and Parliament, though it could be a spoiler by siphoning votes from Conservative candidates.

Farage, who has lost seven campaigns for Parliament, was the rare party leader who didn’t go to the polls Thursday. He voted in advance by mail.

All voters in the U.K. were required to bring identification with them Thursday for the first time in a general election.

A change in the law has required voters in England, Scotland and Wales to prove their identity since 2023 by showing a passport, drivers’ license and more than a dozen other acceptable forms of ID.

Voters in Northern Ireland have had to show ID since 1985, and photo ID since 2003.

The Elections Act introduced by former British Prime Minister Boris Johnson in 2022 was enforced, ironically, earlier this year when Johnson tried to vote without ID in a local election in South Oxfordshire.

He was turned away, but came back later with his identification and cast his vote.

It’s not that you can’t wager on politics. But the odds on the main event this year have become so lopsided that a wager on which party will control Parliament is a bad bet.

In gambling-crazy Britain, politics is fair game for betting. The subject has received more attention than normal in this election because of a scandal revolving around what date the election would be set — one of the many gambling possibilities.

Tens of millions of pounds are expected to be wagered on this year’s election, but that will be dwarfed in the fall by the amount bet on the U.S. election. The presidential election in 2020 became the world’s biggest betting event on the Betfair Exchange, with 1.7 billion pounds wagered.

▶ Read more about political betting in the UK election.

Communities all over the United Kingdom such as Henley-on-Thames are locked in tight contests in which traditional party loyalties come second to more immediate concerns about the economy, crumbling infrastructure and the National Health Service.

Though it has traditionally been a Conservative Party stronghold, the area may change its stripes. The Tories have been beset by sluggish growth, declining public services and a series of scandals, making them easy targets for critics on the left and right.

“This is a blue (Conservative) town, always has been,’’ restaurant manager Sam Wilkinson said. “My generation won’t necessarily vote blue, not necessarily, but at the same time who else do you vote for? It’s really tricky.”

Residents steadily streamed to the polling station, including Patricia Mulcahy, who is retired.

“The younger generation are far more interested in change,’’ she said. “So, I think whatever happens in Henley, in the country, there will be a big shift.”

Former Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn, who is running for reelection as an independent, has voted in his north London district.

Corbyn posted a photo of himself on X outside a polling station with his right thumb up, saying: “Just voted for the independent candidate in Islington North. I heard he’s alright.”

Corbyn, a socialist who has won his seat for Labour at every general election since 1983, was suspended from the party and barred from running by Labour after his leadership faced antisemitism allegations.

He became deeply unpopular after Labour in 2019 suffered its worst defeat since 1935. Keir Starmer replaced Corbyn as party leader and he has rebuilt Labour and moved it closer to the center.

Liberal Democrat leader Ed Davey has cast his vote in a suburb in southwest London.

“It’s a beautiful day,” he said as he left the polling station in Surbiton. “I hope lots of people come out to vote.”

His left-of-center party could gain a larger share of seats. The party had 15 of the 650 seats in the House of Commons when Parliament was dissolved in May.

Davey’s Lib Dems have been trying to make inroads in areas of southern England where Conservatives are vulnerable.

Davey’s stunt-filled campaign has been a publicity bonanza. He has tumbled off a paddleboard into a lake, braved roller coaster rides and bungee jumped, urging voters to take “a leap of faith.”

Labour Party leader Keir Starmer voted Thursday in an election that is widely expected to return his party to power for the first time in 14 years and make him prime minister.

Starmer, who has warned his supporters not to take the election for granted despite polls and politicians predicting a landslide, voted in his London neighborhood.

Pollsters have given Labour a double-digit lead since before the campaign began six weeks ago.

Starmer has spent his time criss-crossing Britain and urging voters to vote for change.

He has pledged to revive a sluggish economy, invest in the nation’s crumbling infrastructure and repair the broken National Health Service, which his center-left party founded in 1945.

Scottish National Party leader John Swinney voted as his party fights to hold off a wave of support from the rival Labour Party.

Swinney, who became the SNP’s third leader in just over a year in May, has tried to bring stability to a party in turmoil.

Scotland’s long-serving First Minister Nicola Sturgeon abruptly stepped down last year during a campaign finance investigation that eventually led to criminal charges against her husband, who was the party’s chief executive.

Swinney joined the party at 15 years old, and previously led the party from 2000 to 2004.

Swinney has said that if his party wins a majority of seats in Scotland he will try to open Scottish independence negotiations with the London-based U.K. government. He wants to rejoin the European Union and the European single market.

Swinney walked to the polls in Burrelton Village Hall, Perthshire, with his 13-year-old son Matthew.

The UK elections have a distinct vocabulary that draws on traditions of parliamentary democracy as well as modern political slogans and spin.

The Associated Press broke down some key words and phrases, such as:

Coalition Goverment — A rarity in the United Kingdom, a coalition government is one in which two or more political parties divide up ministerial posts, compromise on policies and agree to govern in concert. Marginal Seat — Constituencies won by a small margin and thus more likely to switch hands in an election. The opposite is a safe seat.Tactical Voting — The practice of voters backing a party they wouldn’t usually support in order to defeat another candidate.

▶ Read the AP’s glossary of UK election terms.

The Conservatives have faced one challenge after another since they took power in 2010.

First, there was the fallout from the global financial crisis, which swelled Britain’s debt and caused the Tories to impose years of austerity to balance the budget. They then led Britain out of the European Union, battled one of the deadliest COVID-19 outbreaks in western Europe, and saw inflation soar after Russia invaded Ukraine.

Regardless of the circumstances, many voters blame the Conservatives for the litany of problems facing Britain, from sewage spills and unreliable train service to the cost-of-living crisis, crime and the influx of migrants crossing the English Channel on inflatable boats.

▶ Read more about how the election works.

Prime Minister Rishi Sunak cast his ballot Thursday in a national election that will determine if he remains in office.

Sunak, who tried to bring stability to a Conservative Party in chaos when he was picked as leader in October 2022, spent the past six weeks trying to persuade voters across the U.K. to give his party another term after 14 years in power.

Pollsters and politicians widely expect the Labour Party to win for the first time since 2005.

Sunak’s campaign got off to a soggy start when he called the snap election in a downpour outside 10 Downing Street in May.

He had been expected to wait until the fall, when expected improvements in the economy would give him a better chance.

Sunak voted shortly after polls opened in his constituency in Yorkshire in northern England.

Sunak surprised pundits and most of his own lawmakers six weeks ago when he set the election for July 4, at least three months earlier than expected.

While most observers thought the vote would take place in the fall, Sunak gambled on a summer election, hoping that positive economic news would help him persuade voters that Conservative policies were beginning to work.

The decision was so startling that it landed the Tories in hot water. Allegations have emerged that party members and police officers assigned to protect government officials had placed wagers on a summer election, suggesting they had inside information and damaging Sunak’s ability to claim that his party is more trustworthy than Labour.

Commentators had been speculating about the timing of the election for months because the parliamentary term was scheduled to end in mid-December. While each parliament is elected for up to five years, the prime minister can call an election whenever it is most advantageous politically.

▶ Read more about how the election works.

The economy: Britain has struggled with high inflation and slow economic growth, which have combined to make most people feel poorer.

Immigration: Thousands of asylum seekers and economic migrants have crossed the English Channel in flimsy inflatable boats in recent years, triggering criticism that the government has lost control of Britain’s borders.

Health care: Britain’s National Health Service, which provides free health care to everyone, is plagued with long waiting lists for everything from dental care to cancer treatment.

The environment: Sunak has backtracked on a series of environmental commitments, pushing back the deadline for ending the sale of gasoline- and diesel-powered passenger vehicles and authorizing new oil drilling in the North Sea.

▶ Read more about how the election works.

People throughout the United Kingdom will elect all 650 members of the House of Commons, one for each local constituency. There are no primaries or run-offs, just a single round of voting today, July 4.

Britain uses a “first past the post” system of voting, which means that the candidate that finishes top in each constituency will be elected, even if they don’t get 50% of the vote. This has generally cemented the dominance of the two largest parties, Conservatives and Labour, because it is difficult for smaller parties to win seats unless they have concentrated support in particular areas.

The party that commands a majority in the Commons, either alone or with the support of another party, will form the next government and its leader will be prime minister.

That means the results will determine the political direction of the government, which has been led by the center-right Conservatives for the past 14 years. The center-left Labour Party is widely seen to be in the strongest position.

▶ Read more about how the election works.

British voters are picking a new government today, voting in a parliamentary election that is widely expected to bring the Labour Party to power against a gloomy backdrop of economic malaise, mounting distrust in institutions and a fraying social fabric.

A jaded electorate is delivering its verdict on Prime Minister Rishi Sunak’s Conservative Party, which has been in power since 2010.

The center-left Labour Party led by Keir Starmer has had a steady and significant lead in opinion polls for months, but its leaders have warned against taking the election result for granted, worried their supporters will stay home.