The Kingswood byelection result poses a challenge for Jacob Rees-Mogg — as more than 32k of the now-Labour seat's voters will join his constituency for the general election.

The Labour Party took the suburban Bristol constituency off the Conservatives last night, overturning the 11,220 majority of Chris Skidmore — who triggered the byelection after stepping down as a Conservative MP over the party's support of oil and gas. It was a difficult night for the Conservatives, who also lost another byelection in Wellingborough, but Mr Rees-Mogg will have been paying particular attention.

His North East Somerset seat will face major boundary changes for the general election which is expected to happen later this year. Some strong Labour-voting areas such as Radstock and Westfield will be leaving the constituency, moving instead into Frome and East Somerset. Meanwhile, Kingswood will be abolished and the southern half of the constituency will join his to create North East Somerset and Hanham.

Like North East Somerset, Kingswood has elected Conservatives since 2010. But the byelection result suggests the mood has changed in what will soon be part of Mr Rees-Mogg's constituency.

Mr Rees-Mogg told the Bristol Post at the count that he was not nervous. He said: "I won my seat in 2010 from the seat that had previously been Labour and I've always thought of my constituency as being a marginal seat."

He added: "All sensible Members of Parliament do; there's no such thing as a freehold in the House of Commons.

"What I'm trying to do is to carry on working for my constituents and campaigning as I have done since 2006, four years before I was elected. That's part of politics, that's part of a politician's job."

Although Kingswood went Labour last night, byelections often produce a different result to general elections. The odds are usually stacked against the party in government, and turnout is usually lower.

Only 25,905 turned out to vote on Thursday (February 15) — about half the number who turned out to vote in the 2019 general election. Both Labour and the Conservatives received fewer votes than in 2019. But while Labour received 5,316 fewer votes (still enough to hand it 45% of the vote), the Conservatives received 19,037 fewer votes (dropping their share of the vote from 56% to 35%).

Meanwhile, Reform UK (formerly the Brexit Party) came in third place with 2,578 votes (10%). Mr Rees-Mogg told Bristol Live: "If those voters had voted Conservative, the Conservatives would've won. The challenge to the Conservative Party is how do we appeal to them to sway them."

A major YouGov poll released a month ago which made predictions for the new election boundaries put Reform as set to win a similar nine per cent of the vote in the new North East Somerset and Hanham seat. The poll had Mr Rees-Mogg keep his seat — but with a share of the vote only one per cent greater than Labour's.

Speaking to the Local Democracy Reporting Service at the time, YouGov's director of political analytics Dr Patrick English said Mr Rees-Mogg should be "worried," warning: "Either side could very realistically win."

Dr English added: "It's hard to say what would happen if Reform backed out. We think about one third would go back to the Tories, and less than that would go to Labour."

In Kingswood, if every single Reform voter had backed the Conservatives, the Tories would have beat Labour but with a majority of just 77.

No date for the general election has yet been set but Prime Minister Rishi Sunak has indicated it will be in the second half of 2024. It legally must be held by January 2025.