Bev Craig elected Greater Manchester mayor

Bev Craig has been elected mayor of Greater Manchester, keeping the northern English city region under Labour control after Andy Burnham returned to parliament.

Craig, the leader of Manchester City Council, was elected after a second round of counting. Published results showed she won 47.15 percent of first-round votes, short of the 50 percent needed to win outright.

Reform UK came second with 21 percent in the first round. After second preferences were counted, Craig had 309,525 votes, compared with 157,178 for Reform candidate Sian Astley.

More than two million people were eligible to vote in Thursday's poll, and turnout was just under 25 percent.

Burnham first won the Greater Manchester mayoralty in 2017 and was re-elected twice, most recently in 2024 with 63 percent of the vote. He won the Makerfield parliamentary by-election in June after announcing in May that he would seek a return to Westminster.