Labour’s Sagal Abdi-Wali Defeats Zack Polanski in Holborn and St Pancras
Abdi-Wali won by 3,364 votes in the October 8 election. The result followed a contentious Green conference vote, but the tally cannot establish what drove voters’ choices.
Labour’s Sagal Abdi-Wali won the Holborn and St Pancras parliamentary election held on October 8, 2026, defeating Green Party leader Zack Polanski by 12,292 votes to 8,928. Camden Council’s official declaration gives her a majority of 3,364 and records turnout at 38.76%.
The result retained for Labour the London constituency previously represented by Keir Starmer. Parliament confirmed on October 9 that the election followed the former prime minister’s resignation from the Commons in September. It was a parliamentary contest for a single seat, not a council election.
The official count
Conservative Ewan Cameron finished third with 1,922 votes, followed by Peter Newman of Reform UK with 1,612 and Liberal Democrat Patrick Thomas Stillman with 924. Tyler Kurtis Johnson of Restore Britain received 692 and George Galloway of the Workers Party 314.
The remaining candidates were Briony Anne Lonbay Kapoor of Rejoin EU, 236; Barmy Brunch of the Official Monster Raving Loony Party, 87; Helen Spiby-Vann of the Christian Peoples Alliance, 63; Clare Fischer of the Climate Party, 51; Ben Walker of UKIP, 51; Ketankumar Pipaliya of UK VOICE, 23; Jonathan Silberman of the Communist League, nine; and Tom Darwood, standing without a description, seven.
These are Camden’s figures. The council also recorded 108 rejected ballots, comprising 43 marked for more than one candidate and 65 left unmarked or void for uncertainty. Rejected ballots are separate from votes allocated to the candidates.
From Camden leadership to Parliament
Abdi-Wali entered the contest as Camden Council’s leader. The National’s reporting described her as Somali born and said she grew up in the borough after arriving in Britain as a refugee. Her campaign emphasised local concerns, including housing and public services.
Her victory moves a local government figure into the constituency’s parliamentary role. That role concerns representation in the House of Commons and is distinct from running the council, even though both serve residents in the same area.
The result also left the Green leader outside the Commons. The gap between the first two candidates was substantial enough to settle the seat, but the total alone provides no breakdown of voters’ reasons for choosing either party or staying home.
The Green conference context
The Barnet Post described the election as the Greens’ first test after members adopted a controversial motion on Zionism at their October 4 conference. The motion characterised Zionism as racism and supported a single state replacing Israel. The vote preceded the election by four days; no reliable voter study in the material reviewed establishes how much it affected the result.
For the constituency, the confirmed outcome is a Labour hold under a new MP. For the parties, the political debate now rests on interpreting a result whose vote totals and turnout are public, but whose individual motivations are not.
