How it works, what the polls show and who can vote

British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak and Labor Opposition Leader Keir Starmer

On July 4, Britons will vote in a general election that will decide who will be appointed as Prime Minister. Labour's Keir Starmer, a renowned former human rights lawyer who was also director of public prosecutions in England and Wales, is the favorite to become Britain's next prime minister, according to opinion polls. Prime Minister Rishi Sunak, 44, will try to be elected for the first time in a popular vote: he will take office in October 2022 through the post of conservative representatives. However, he is trailing in the election polls, signaling a defeat for the conservatives after 14 years in power. The election was called by Conservative Prime Minister Rishi Sunak, who secured King Charles III's consent to dissolve Parliament. The announcement marked the start of a five-week campaign. At the end of the term representatives lost their status and had to reapply to retain their position. The government entered a “pre-election period” known as “purdha” that restricts any decision until the next administrator is appointed.

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These are the first elections since December 2019, and will result in a fourth British prime minister in less than two years. This is because the Conservatives, led by Boris Johnson, won by a wide margin over Labor at the time, although he left office in 2022 after a series of scandals. Johnson was replaced in Downing Street by the short-lived Liz Truss, who sowed chaos in financial markets with unfunded tax cut announcements during her 49 days in power, before being replaced by Rishi Sunak on October 25, 2022. During Truce's tenure, Queen Elizabeth II died on September 8, 2022.

How does the election work?

oh UK, made up of England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, is divided into 650 parliamentary constituencies. In each of them, voters vote for their preferred candidate. There is only one round of elections and the person who gets the most votes is elected as the Member of Parliament for the constituency. If a party wins at least 326 seats, it forms the government and its leader becomes the prime minister. If neither party reaches this quota, the political party with the most representatives forms a coalition, as the Conservative Party did with the Liberal Democrats in 2010. The party in second place becomes the main opposition party.

Opinion polls point to victory for the Left

The Labor Party, which has not been in power since 2010, has been leading the polls for two years. Opinion polls put it at risk, with voting intentions ranging from 40% to 48%, with the far-right's second-highest vote-threatened status ahead of the conservative party, which has a very low rating of 20%. The right-wing Reform UK Party, led by Eurosceptic Nigel Farage, has already surpassed 15% in some opinion polls. This Conservative decline appears to be related to the economic crisis and internal divisions within the party, with five prime ministers since the Brexit vote in 2016, rather than enthusiasm for the measures proposed by Labour. If the polls are correct, Labor leader Keir Starmer, a former barrister, will be prime minister with the support of his party's absolute majority.

*With information from AFP