Sagal Abdi-Wali wins Holborn and St Pancras seat after Keir Starmer’s resignation

Sagal Abdi-Wali won the Holborn and St Pancras by-election in north London on Thursday, 8 October 2026, becoming the constituency’s Labour MP after Keir Starmer resigned in September. Camden Council recorded 12,292 votes for Abdi-Wali and 8,928 for Green Party leader Zack Polanski. The result gives residents a new representative whose stated priorities include housing, homelessness and access to work for young people.

The council’s published result puts Abdi-Wali 3,364 votes ahead of Polanski. Turnout was 38.76%. Conservative candidate Ewan Cameron received 1,922 votes, Reform UK’s Peter Newman 1,612 and Liberal Democrat Patrick Stillman 924. Those figures establish the size of the win in the count; they do not explain why individual voters made their choices.

What the Holborn and St Pancras result shows

The election filled the vacancy created by Starmer’s resignation, according to UK Parliament. Camden Council’s count also recorded 108 rejected ballots: 43 marked for more than one candidate and 65 unmarked or void for uncertainty. The council published the full candidate tally and turnout, giving residents a way to check the result beyond the leading candidates’ totals.

Abdi-Wali’s victory came against a prominent opponent: Polanski leads the Green Party. The Guardian reported that friends involved in her campaign credited her longstanding local connections with helping Labour’s effort. That is their assessment of the campaign, rather than a finding about voters’ motives. The result itself establishes who won and by how much.

Abdi-Wali’s Camden roots and council record

Her local political career began before this contest. The Guardian reported that community volunteering and Labour Party work preceded her election to Camden Council in 2022. She became the council’s cabinet member responsible for housing in 2024 and was elected council leader in May 2026. The newspaper also reported her work with youth groups, service as a school governor and involvement in founding football clubs.

In her acceptance speech, Abdi-Wali called the election ‘deeply personal’, according to The Guardian. She said she hoped her journey would inspire ‘people who look like me’. Those comments describe what the victory means to her; the council’s count provides the separate measure of the electoral result.

Housing and jobs among her stated priorities

Abdi-Wali said in her acceptance speech that homelessness and housing would be priorities as an MP, The Guardian reported. She also said she would call for Thames Water to be brought into public ownership and work to increase young people’s access to jobs and apprenticeships. These are stated aims. The available accounts do not establish when any proposal might advance or what she will achieve in Parliament.

Housing is also an area in which her council record has drawn scrutiny. The Guardian reported that she held Camden’s housing brief when the Housing Ombudsman published a critical report on the council’s service in November 2024. Friends quoted by the newspaper defended her record and said she had been in the post for six months at the time. Her stated housing priority as an MP therefore comes with an existing public record for residents to assess.

The immediate confirmed change is the constituency’s representation: Abdi-Wali takes the seat previously held by Starmer. Her acceptance speech sets out issues she intends to pursue, while the election figures show the mandate she won in this contest. The timetable and results of those priorities remain to be established by her work as an MP.