Comfortable victory, but uncomfortable numbers for Labour in Greater Manchester

In the end it wasn't close. Labour's Bev Craig comfortably held the Greater Manchester (GM) mayoralty, vacated last month by Andy Burnham.

Craig won 47% of first preferences, well above what polling had predicted, though not quite enough to avoid a run-off against the second-placed Reform, which Labour also won handily.

Nearly 60% of those who cast a ballot backed Labour in the first or second round, a remarkable recovery in a city-region where the party had collapsed just months earlier in local elections.

Labour's performance does not look quite so impressive if we zoom out a bit further. The party's first preference share was down 16 points on Andy Burnham's 2024 win (though this was under a different electoral system).

Labour never dropped below 60% on first preferences under Burnham. Though Bev Craig won comfortably, this is now a more competitive city-region.

Runners-up Reform will be pleased to have pushed Labour into a second round, but disappointed not to have run the winners closer.

An aggregate vote share of 21% on first preferences, and under 30% with second preferences added, will have been at the bottom end of the party's expectations.

Reform had topped the poll across Greater Manchester in May's local elections, sweeping dozens of councillors out of office. Though this is by a large margin Reform's strongest ever performance in a Greater Manchester mayoral election, it is only their fifth best performance in all mayoral elections, behind all four of last May's contests.

After over a year ahead in the national polls, they will have hoped for better.

But there were some consolations for Reform, and concerns for Labour, in the borough-by-borough results.

Nigel Farage's party secured over 25% of the vote in five of GM's outer boroughs, and hit 30% in Wigan, Andy Burnham's home borough. That could herald further gains for Reform in next May's local elections, when the party will hope to wrest some of these boroughs out of Labour control.

The Greens will also be disappointed. Less than six months after their by-election triumph in Gorton and Denton, they have fallen back into a distant third place with just over 12% of the first preference vote. This is only their sixth best performance in a mayoral election, weaker than results achieved in the West of England, South Yorkshire and West Yorkshire when the party was less popular in national polling.

One consolation for the Greens will be their second-place finish with 24% in Manchester itself - the party will still hope to cause Bev Craig some headaches in her home borough in local elections next year.

This was a disastrous night for the Conservatives, who had come second in all three previous Mayoral races but dropped to fifth place in this one, winning less than 8% of the first preference vote.

The Liberal Democrats also had a night to forget, winning under 3% of first preferences, comfortably their worst ever showing in the four mayoral contests to date.

The biggest story from the trailing pack was instead Restore Britain, the party founded by former Reform UK MP Rupert Lowe in February.

Restore came in fourth place overall, beating the Conservatives and winning nearly 9% of first preferences, a remarkable showing for a brand-new party.

Restore campaigned as a more uncompromising, hardline version of Reform, and their gains here, as in Makerfield last month, may well have come at Reform's expense.

Restore won over 12% in Oldham, Rochdale and Tameside, all boroughs which featured strong Reform performances in May.

The largest by-election in British history did not, in the end, excite Greater Manchester's electors.

Turnout across Greater Manchester was a shade over 25%, down nearly seven points on the 2024 figure. This was the lowest figure recorded in GM's four contests, and the third lowest for any combined authority mayoral election.

An uncompetitive contest held in the school and university summer holiday season was always going to struggle to engage voters. But with devolution now promoted as a route to political renewal, it will concern the new prime minister that so many in Greater Manchester have greeted the prospect of choosing his replacement with a yawn of indifference.

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(c) Sky News 2026: Comfortable victory, but uncomfortable numbers for Labour in Greater Manchester