Polling day was 8 October and Labour's Sagal Abdi-Wali won by 3,364 votes. Every deadline the council set, from the writ to the overnight count, in one place.

Camden has named the day. The Holborn and St Pancras by-election will be held on Thursday 8 October 2026, and the council has now published every deadline that follows from it.

Updated 11 October: the by-election is over. Labour’s Sagal Abdi-Wali won on 8 October with 12,292 votes to the Green leader Zack Polanski’s 8,928, a majority of 3,364 on a 38.76 per cent turnout. The full result, every candidate’s votes and what it means for Camden Council.

Updated 3 October: every registration, postal and proxy deadline has now passed. Polls open 7am to 10pm on Thursday 8 October. Three polling stations have moved: RADA Studios voters go to the Chamber, 12 Bloomsbury Square; London Irish Centre voters go to St Paul’s Church, Camden Square; and Castlehaven Community Centre voters go to Castlehaven Community Hub, 21 Castlehaven Road. Postal votes can be handed in at any Camden polling station or the Town Hall on Judd Street until 10pm, and a lost or spoilt postal pack can be replaced until 5pm on polling day (Camden Council, 23 September).

We said on 8 September that we would report the notice of election as soon as it appeared. It is dated 8 September and signed by Jon Rowney, the Acting Returning Officer. The council set out what it means for voters in a statement on 11 September.

Five dates now matter, and four of them fall in the next three weeks:

  • 4pm on Tuesday 15 September, nominations close. The list of candidates is published at 5pm the same day.
  • 11.59pm on Tuesday 22 September, the deadline to register to vote.
  • 5pm on Wednesday 23 September, the deadline to apply for a postal vote, or to change or cancel an existing postal or proxy arrangement.
  • 5pm on Wednesday 30 September, the deadline for a proxy vote and for a Voter Authority Certificate, the free photo ID for people who have none.
  • Thursday 8 October, polling day. Votes are counted overnight and the council says the result will go on its website.
Timeline of the Holborn and St Pancras by-election deadlines: nominations close at 4pm on 15 September, registration closes 22 September, postal votes 23 September, proxy votes and Voter Authority Certificates 30 September, polling day 8 October.
Graphic by Camden Today
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Why 8 October, and not any other Thursday

The returning officer had a choice, but a narrow one.

Under the parliamentary elections timetable in Schedule 1 to the Representation of the People Act 1983, a by-election poll must be held on the 17th, 18th or 19th day after the last day for delivering nomination papers. Rule 2 of the same Schedule says Saturdays, Sundays and bank holidays do not count.

Nominations close on Tuesday 15 September. Count 17 working days from there and you land on Thursday 8 October. The 18th is Friday 9 October and the 19th is Monday 12 October. 8 October is the earliest day the law allowed and the only Thursday in the window, which is why the choice was effectively made for him.

The same Schedule fixes the hours: 7 in the morning to 10 at night.

Nominations close at 4pm on Tuesday

Anyone standing has until 4pm on Tuesday 15 September to deliver nomination papers by hand to the Acting Returning Officer at Camden Town Hall, Judd Street, WC1H 9JE. Papers can be handed in from 10am to 4pm on weekdays only. The deposit is £500, and the notice sets out the bank details for paying it by BACS.

Until that moment nobody is a candidate in any official sense. The list becomes real when the statement of persons nominated is published, which Camden says will be at 5pm on Tuesday 15 September.

Three parties have said something about their own candidate so far.

  • Green. The Green Party announced on 11 September that its leader, Zack Polanski, will contest the seat. Its own statement says he was chosen at a local party hustings the night before and that the announcement was made at Kings Place in Camden. Polanski said he was “proud and honoured to have been selected for a by-election in the constituency where I have lived and worked for much of the past 20 years”, and that “Greens are underdogs here but we have the momentum”. (Green Party, 11 September 2026)
  • Labour. The candidate is Sagal Abdi-Wali, the Leader of Camden Council and councillor for Camden Square ward. Her campaign website, Sagal Abdi-Wali for Holborn and St Pancras, carries the legal imprint the law requires on election material: promoted by Larry Culhane on behalf of Sagal Abdi-Wali, both at 130 Euston Road, NW1 2AY. We have not found a dated statement about the selection on the Labour Party’s own website. Who she is, what her campaign promises against Camden’s own records, and what happens to the council if she wins are in our report on her selection.
  • Liberal Democrat. Camden Liberal Democrats’ own by-election page still said on 14 September that the party “will be formally selecting our candidate in due course”.

We are not reporting a full candidate list from party announcements or from other newspapers. There is no list until the returning officer publishes one, and that is on Tuesday.

The last result in this seat

Holborn and St Pancras was fought on its current boundaries for the first time in 2024. The House of Commons Library’s record of that result gives an electorate of 71,300, a turnout of 54.1 per cent and 38,602 valid votes.

Sir Keir Starmer took 18,884 votes, or 48.9 per cent, a majority of 11,572 over the independent Andrew Feinstein on 7,312. The Green candidate David Stansell was third on 4,030, or 10.4 per cent, which is the figure behind the Green Party’s claim to have passed 10 per cent here. The Conservatives took 7.2 per cent, Reform UK 6.1 per cent and the Liberal Democrats 5.8 per cent.

The photo ID rules catch people out

You cannot vote in person without original photo ID, and a poll card does not count.

Camden lists passports, driving licences, Blue Badges, the Oyster 60+ card, the Freedom Pass and PASS proof-of-age cards among the accepted documents. Expired ID is fine as long as you still look like the photograph, and the name on it should match the name you registered under.

If you have none of those, the Voter Authority Certificate is free, but it has a hard cut-off: 5pm on Wednesday 30 September, with no applications accepted afterwards and none issued on polling day. You need a photograph of yourself and your National Insurance number. Camden says application forms are available at its libraries, and its electoral services team can be reached on 020 7974 4444 or at electoral.services@camden.gov.uk.

Nine Camden wards have no vote in this

Camden is split between two constituencies and only one of them is voting. Ten wards are in Holborn and St Pancras. Nine, including Hampstead Town, Highgate, Belsize, Kilburn and West Hampstead, are in Hampstead and Highgate and are not part of this election. Primrose Hill ward is divided between the two by polling district.

The full ward lists, and the reason the writ was issued at all, are in our earlier report on the by-election.

What it means for you

  • If you are not registered, do it by 11.59pm on Tuesday 22 September. Nothing else on this page matters if you miss that one.
  • Want a postal vote? Apply by 5pm on Wednesday 23 September, and do not leave it to the last afternoon.
  • No passport or driving licence? Apply for a Voter Authority Certificate by 5pm on Wednesday 30 September.
  • Poll cards are being posted to registered voters now. Your polling station is printed on the card, and the council publishes the situation of polling stations alongside the candidate list.
  • If you live in Primrose Hill ward, check which polling district you are in before you assume you can vote.
  • The full candidate list appears at 5pm on Tuesday. We will publish it here once the returning officer does.

The MP this election returns does not run bin rounds, parking or council tax. Camden Council does, and our pages on bin collection days, council tax bands and parking in Camden cover those.

Sources