Incumbent Sunak pitted against Starmer as Britain votes

When either Sunak or Starmer takes to the stage to hail victory in the British election tomorrow, they will be joined at their moment of triumph by either a man with a trash can on his head or someone dressed as Elmo from Sesame Street.

Among the more than 4,500 candidates standing for election to Parliament’s 650 seats are those from fringe parties, single-issue campaigners and, in a peculiarly British tradition, those who are simply making fun of the whole thing.

The best-known figure in the latter category is Count Binface, “an intergalactic space warrior, leader of the Recyclons from planet sigma IX,” who will be challenging Sunak in his constituency in northern England.

Dressed in a silver outfit with matching cape and wearing a silver trash can as a helmet, Binface says that he wants to make the election “Bindependence Day” and that he is the “sane” choice for the electorate.

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Experts are expecting low voter turnout in today’s U.K. election as many across the country feel increasingly politically homeless — and hopeless about the future.

Just over 67% of people registered to vote in the U.K.’s last general election in 2019 cast their ballots, compared with 68.8% in 2017. John Curtice, one of Britain’s leading polling experts, said he wouldn’t be surprised if voter turnout is “on the low side” again.

“There’s clearly considerable disenchantment for the current government, but there isn’t a lot of enthusiasm for the alternative,” he said.

With the British press under a strict reporting blackout while voting is taking place, a social media trend has filled the gap in recent years: #dogsatpollingstations.

Open up X or Instagram on any election day in the U.K. and you’ll see proud dog-owners (and the occasional cat-owner) killing two birds with one stone and taking their pooch for a walk while exercising their democratic rights.

Among our favorites is Mungo, whose human is none other than NBC News London’s platforms and social media editor Annie Hill.

Britain has been mired in a cost-of-living crisis. Real wages have flatlined for a decade — the U.K.’s average salary is 29,669 pounds (about $38,000) — and prices have spiraled for utilities and food. Meanwhile, Britain has the worst rate of homelessness in the developed world, according to the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, and 30% of children are growing up in poverty, government figures show.

Rishi Sunak says “brighter days” are ahead after inflation fell back from 11% in 2022 to the target of 2% last month. His party has promised cuts to taxes and public spending, which some economists say are unrealistic given how threadbare budgets already are.

Cautious of the Conservative accusation that it’s irresponsible with the economy, Labour has refused to raise income taxes. Some economists say if Labour wants to boost public services, then some sort of hike may be unavoidable.

Other key issues for voters are the NHS, which is beloved but underfunded and dilapidated, and rising immigration despite post-Brexit promises that this would fall. Meanwhile Sunak has staked much of his manifesto on a controversial plan to deport asylum-seekers to Rwanda, as well as introducing mandatory national service for 18-year-olds.

Just a handful of holidaymakers dot the pier of what was once a bustling seaside resort. But change is in the air in Clacton-on-Sea, a sleepy backwater that may become the vanguard for the British right wing if it elects Nigel Farage, a close ally of former President Donald Trump, to Parliament today. 

“He hasn’t proven himself, but we’ll give him a chance,” Neville Hurling, 67, said as he sat outside on the patio of the Moon and Starfish Wetherspoon pub last week during a rare mini-heat wave. 

Farage, who leads the right-wing Reform UK party and is one of Britain’s most divisive public figures, had celebrated the launch of his campaign from the same pub just days earlier.

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Starmer is running against Sunak, whose Conservative Party has run the country 14 years.

But for a man who could rule this key American ally, the world’s sixth-largest economy, there is little consensus about what kind of leader Starmer, 61, would be or even what kind of man he is.

He has the most blue-collar upbringing of any candidate in a generation while at the same time being the first since the 1950s to already have the title “Sir” after having been knighted by the monarchy. He is a vegetarian and a self-described socialist but also a hate figure for many leftists who accuse him of veering rightward in search of power. And while friends describe him as an affable but hypercompetitive soccer fanatic, in public he often appears stiff and lacking charisma.

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Rishi Sunak has a habit of making history. He’s the United Kingdom’s first British Indian prime minister and its first Hindu leader, and at 42 he was the youngest to take the job in over 200 years. He’s also probably the richest person to govern from No. 10 Downing St.

Now 44, Sunak is about to mark new records in the U.K. general election today.  

Hanging over the electorate is a feeling that there is one set of rules for the elites in London — and another for the rest of Britain after years of Conservative Party rule. Living standards are being squeezed. The gap between the very rich and the rest has continued to widen. There is the widespread perception that public services are not just struggling but on the verge of failing.

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In an effort to make sure that political coverage is impartial on election day, the U.K.’s state broadcasting regulator, Ofcom, is strict about what media outlets based in Britain can and can’t say while the country’s voting.

Because NBC News’ London bureau is covering the election, we’ll be upholding these rules.

They include avoiding direct discussion of issues, individuals and polling related to the election. While content published before voting began is allowed, outlets aren’t allowed to publish anything new on the day of the vote.

When voting closes, though, the gloves are off.

The U.K. general election is very different from its U.S. equivalent in that the British ballot elects both the executive and the legislature at once. In the states, the president and Congress are voted for separately; in Britain, the whole thing is effectively bundled up together.

The British version isn’t a single vote but rather 650 mini-elections held across the country. The results of those 650 counts won’t be confirmed until the early hours of tomorrow morning, with some tight races or races in remote parts of the country delayed until much later that day.

Each of the 650 mini-elections selects one lawmaker to send to the House of Commons. And if one party manages to get more than half of the members of Parliament, or MPs, it can form a government. That party’s leader, also an MP, usually becomes prime minister, who selects Cabinet members mostly from other elected lawmakers.

If no party wins a majority, coalition negotiations begin.

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