Great Britain ---- The by-elections in Great Britain are ringing alarm bells over the shaky Labour leadership of the Starmer government, which suffered a devastating defeat in the by-election for the House of Commons seat in Gorton and Denton, a constituency near Manchester. This diverse constituency includes traditionally working-class neighborhoods once strongly Labour-leaning, now leaning toward Reform as well as a large number of university students and Muslim residents. The defeat is directly attributable to Starmer, who vetoed the candidacy of Andy Burnham, the popular Labour mayor of Greater Manchester, from running in the by-election, considering him a potential rival for the Labour Party leadership. This is Labour's second defeat in a by-election since their return to government in July 2024.
Green Party candidate Hannah Spencer, a 34-year-old plumber, won with 41% of the vote, ahead of candidates from Reform UK (29%) and the Labour Party (25%), becoming the fifth Green Party MP in Parliament. For the first time, the Greens have won a by-election thanks to a widespread campaign on the ground that managed to mobilize 28% of the constituency's Muslim population, ready to vote for them because of their pro-Palestinian stance and strong condemnation of Israel's bloody military retaliation in Gaza. Farage's party candidate, a professor who has become a television commentator for the right-wing broadcaster GB News, came in second.Significantly, the Greens, conquering what was historically considered a Labour stronghold, garnered over 40% of the vote, thus proving themselves a viable alternative to Nigel Farage's Trump-led Reform UK. This is a collapse with serious consequences for the increasingly frail prime minister, who continues to see his leadership of the government and the party under threat. This has intensified following the Mandelson-Epstein scandal, which forced the resignation of one of his closest aides, Peter Mandelson, the seasoned Labour politician, appointed by Starmer as UK ambassador to Washington, to reward him for his support within the party to expel Jeremy Corbyn and marginalize Labour's left-wing wing.
The British leader's crisis is driven by mounting economic and social problems, including the high cost of living and the decline of public services and welfare, the education and research system, growing spending on support for Ukraine, and the recent developments in the Epstein case.
The Greens' success is due to the electorate's disillusionment with Labour's rightward shift, which betrayed Starmer's promises by embracing the right's anti-immigration policies. This was facilitated by the Greens' downplaying environmental policies to support far-left positions, proposing tax increases for the wealthy and openly supporting the Palestinian cause. The right fights with left-wing positions.
Germany
Earlier this month, the Greens won the elections in the state of Baden-Württemberg, located in southwest Germany, with a 30% victory, surpassing Chancellor Merz's Christian Democratic Union (CDU) (27.7%). AfL (18%) emerged as the third largest party, doubling its support compared to the previous election. The SPD fell to its lowest point (5.5%), barely above the electoral threshold; the FDP and the Left remained outside with 4.4% of the vote.
Baden-Württemberg, governed by a CDU-Green alliance, was a particularly close watch because it marked the transition from a Green leader, in government since 2011, to a new phase, led by the new leader Özdemir, who was called upon to defend his party's primacy, and Hagel (CDU), who was committed to restoring the CDU to the regional leadership. The Green Party candidate stated that he wanted to continue the collaboration with the Christian Democratic Union (CDU), with which the Greens have governed for two terms. He stated that the future coalition must be the result of a partnership of equals focused on the good of Baden-Württemberg, and highlighted the results achieved over the past 10 years as a shared success of which the CDU can also
be proud.
This result demonstrates that the far right could consolidate its position even outside the eastern Länder, where it had built its strongest gains, and that the political and social unrest reflected in its advance is creeping into a region like Baden-Württemberg, one of the pillars of the German automotive industry, home to giants like Daimler and Porsche and home to groups like Mercedes-Benz and Bosch. However, Baden-Württemberg is now one of the places where the crisis of the German industrial model has been most visible, pressured by competition from Chinese electric vehicle manufacturers, weak demand, and a still-sluggish national recovery after two years of recession, driven primarily by high energy costs, a direct consequence of the war in Ukraine.
For Merz, the CDU's failure to win represents a problem compounded by its subservient stance toward Trump and the financial strain of the war.
Elections in Rhineland-Palatinate were held on March 22, with 3.2 million voters voting. After 35 years, the CDU overtook the SPD, which had been in uninterrupted government. Merz's party's victory is largely a consequence of the SPD's decline, which is now experiencing a full-blown crisis due to economic stagnation, rising youth crime, and its pro-war policy in Ukraine. Proof of this is the AfD's renewed success, which hovered around 20%, up 11 percentage points compared to the previous elections. This success in the two western German states indicates that the neo-Nazi party's chances of governing in the next general election are growing significantly, thanks to its primary strategy for combating the crisis: a return to purchasing Russian gas and oil. The next regional elections will be held in Saxony-Anhalt on September 6 and in Nörburg-Vorpommern on September 20.
France
The first and second rounds of municipal elections in France were marked by low turnout and strong polarization on both the right and left, further weakening President Emmanuel Macron's centrist coalition. Voter turnout in the first round was below 59%, an increase compared to the 2020 municipal elections, which were impacted by Covid, but down from the 63.5% recorded in 2014, with a record 42% abstention in the second round. In the second round, turnout dropped to 57.82%. The French far right, with Marine Le Pen's National Rally, achieved its best result ever in these municipal elections, considered a test case for the presidential election. The moderate left holds firm in the major cities, with Paris remaining its main stronghold. Emmanuel Grégoire, candidate of the Socialist Party and former deputy to outgoing mayor Anne Hidalgo, is the winner. La France Insoumise (LFI) scored a historic victory in Saint-Denis,
wresting the municipality from the Socialists and becoming the dominant force in the Île-de-France region after the capital. The only centrist who can consider himself satisfied is former Prime Minister Edouard Philippe. Re-elected mayor of Le Havre with over 43 percent of the vote, Philippe has cemented his leadership of the Horizons party and, more importantly, his future presidential candidacy. His success contrasts with the decline of Macron's official candidates, who in many provinces lost votes to right-wing lists.
Over 904,000 candidates competed for elected office in approximately 35,000 municipalities across the country, from large cities to villages with just a few dozen inhabitants. The election campaign was largely overshadowed by the war with Iran and its consequences, particularly its impact on fuel prices.
The results show relative stability among the main political blocs, with twelve right-wing cities in 2026 (the same number as in 2020), six centrist cities (one more than in 2020), 22 left-wing cities (two fewer than in 2020), and two far-right cities (one more than in 2020).
The biggest losers in these elections are primarily the environmentalists, who have retained only three of the seven cities they led before these municipal elections. The right and center have strengthened in medium-sized cities. However, extending the analysis to all cities with more than 10,000 inhabitants, the balance tips in favor of the right and center, as it appears that municipalities classified on the left excluding local lists are much fewer in 2026 than in 2020. Municipalities classified as "different left" number only 148 compared to 196 six years ago. In 2026, municipalities classified as socialist or left-unionist number no more than 129, compared to 141 in 2020. The decline is particularly marked for the Communist Party, which in 2026 has only seven municipalities with more than 10,000 inhabitants, compared to 25 in 2020 controlled by the Ministry of the Interior. Municipalities with a mixed right-wing, LR, or UDI majority have increased to 464, compared to 455 in 2020. Municipalities led by a centrist mayor (Renaissance, MoDem, Orizzonti) have increased to 177, compared to 200 nationally, and their allies now control 37 cities, compared to nine in 2020.
The conflict on the left is looming particularly harsh, as evidenced by the first secretary of the Socialist Party, Olivier Faure, declared that Jean-Luc Mélenchon has "become a burden on the left," condemning, on Monday morning on BFM-TV/RMC, the "excesses" and "anti-Semitic tendencies" of the leader of La France Insoumise. However, as usual, most political parties have declared themselves victorious.
Slovenia
A total of 2.1 million voters cast their ballots in the country. The outgoing governing coalition consisted of the liberal Freedom Movement (Gibanje Svoboda), the Social Democrats (SD), and the ecosocialist left (Levica). The election was marked by extreme polarization and allegations of corruption and foreign interference, particularly by an Israeli fixer firm supporting the right-wing party led by Janez Jansha, a Trump supporter with ties to Victor Ornan.
Slovenia chose continuity, but it did so by the skin of its teeth, and the party led by leader Robert Golob and his Freedom Movement (GS) will need to form a coalition government with smaller parties to govern.
"At a time when populists across Europe are working to undermine democratic institutions, Slovenia stands out for having chosen a different path a stable, centrist, and pro-European leadership to counter far-right policies.
Hungary
On April 12, Hungarians will go to the polls to renew their parliament, and for the first time after four consecutive terms of unchallenged rule (16 years), Viktor Orbán and his Fidesz party are seriously at risk of defeat. His challenger is PMagyar, a former member of his own party, from which he left after revealing a minor Epstein case within Orbán's supporters. The defector took over the leadership of the Tisza party (an acronym for Tisztelet és Szabadság, "Respect and Freedom," in 2024), a movement founded in 2020 that had previously been irrelevant. Magyar has appealed to that segment of the electorate tired of Orban's rule and the system of power he has built, surrounding himself with relatives and clients and organizing a financial network that profits from public contracts and manages lavish European funding, amassing copious personal wealth and nurturing a widespread network of supporters. In this way, he has revitalized an opposition stunned by years of electoral defeats and harsh repression through liberticidal legislation.
Faced with the threat to his power, Orban has taken action by waving the flag of nationalism and has identified Ukraine, and the financing of its war against Russia, as the reasons that should drive the Hungarian people to continue supporting his policies. Orban has been wise to point out that Ukraine forcefully beats Hungarians into conscription and sends Hungarian-speaking and ethnic Hungarians from Transcarpathia, a region Ukraine has annexed, despite it being a land of Hungarian language, culture, and tradition. He also denounced the interruption of the Druzba Friendship pipeline, which supplies Russian oil to Hungary and Slovakia, as an action contrary to Hungary's economic interests, depriving the country of the low-cost energy essential to its economy. As a retaliatory measure, Orban withheld his consent to Ukraine's accession to the European Union and denounced the corruption of the Kiev regime, exploiting the seizure by Hungarian customs officers of a convoy from the Ukrainian state bank Oschadbank, carrying EUR35 million (US$40 million) and 9 kg of gold, bound for Switzerland, through the country, raising suspicions that they were being used to finance his opponent's election campaign.
Clearly, a battle to the death is underway, especially considering that Orban's party is significantly behind in the most credible polls and that the European Union is certainly doing everything it can to replicate the ploy used in Romania to ensure the victory of pro-EU candidates.
Of course, Orban's illiberal regime, its repression of civil and democratic liberties, its denial of the rule of law, and its sex-phobic and obscurantist policies, do not inspire any sympathy, nor do the labor laws that force Hungarian workers into compulsory and unpaid labor for employers. But Brussels is not confident in relying on Magyar to neutralize Orban. The opposition candidate is not gentle toward Ukraine, nor toward European politics and the European Union: perhaps he does so out of electoral opportunism, but he remains highly ambiguous about his future intentions.
The Editorial Staff
https://www.ucadi.org/2026/03/28/osservatorio-politico-10/
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Source: A-infos-en@ainfos.ca
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