Old Bexley and Sidcup held a by-election yesterday, two months after James Brokenshire died. The local Conservative MP died in October following a protracted battle with lung cancer, and the constituency became the fifth to hold a by-election in 2021. The results held in his party's favour, but just barely, as the British public voiced discontent with the country's current leadership and migrated to Labour.

       Results from the race show the Conservatives held a depreciating majority in the traditionally true-blue area.

       They elected Louie French, an ex-councillor for the constituency, with 11,180 votes.

       That total translates to 51.5 percent of the vote but will have sparked some concern amongst Conservative leadership.

       Mr Brokenshire led with a majority of 18,952 after the 2019 bout.

       READ MORE: Britons celebrate Tories by-election win

       The results show the Tories lost support from 13.1 percent of locals - 14,474 votes.

       And Labour capitalised on this, growing their influence in the area.

       The party's candidate Daniel Francis claimed 6,711 votes, 30.9 percent of the total share.

       Mr Francis managed to increase Labour's support by 7.4 percent on 2019.

       Their success wasn't stomping, however, as Sir Keir Starmer failed to cut the Tory majority below 50 percent.

       Also making gains was the right-wing populist party Reform UK, which secured its highest support margin since its 2018 debut.

       They came in fourth behind Labour, with serial candidate Richard Tice able to convince 1,432 votes, 6.6 percent.

       The party celebrated its "best result yet in a Parliamentary by-election".

       The Greens and Liberal Democrats came in at the tail end of yesterday's polls.

       The Green Party, represented by Jonathan Rooks, scored 830 votes, 3.8 percent of the vote with a 0.6 percent swing.

       The Liberal Democrats only convinced 647 voters to turn out in their favour, as Simone Reynolds captured a three percent share.

       Their placement came from an alleged informal pact to give Labour a free run of the by-election but caused their support to collapse by 5.3 percent.

       The overall feeling from yesterday's bout amongst the British political class is fractured, with both Labour and the Conservatives celebrating and commiserating.

       The race hasn't ended up surprising, with pollsters noting the swing wasn't unusual and fell within the expected average.

       Both parties will have shared some concern over voter turnout in the constituency, however, which may show general discontent with the state of British politics.

       Only 34 percent of Old Bexley and Sidcup's roughly 65,161 strong electorate turned out to cast a vote.