General Election 2024: Who will be first to declare as more North East seats in with a chance

The contest to be the first seat to declare on election night appears to be intensifying again with more contenders seemingly in the mix than usual.

The North East's ballot counters have earned a reputation for being the quickest in the country and have been the first to declare since 1992.

Sunderland was first to call at every election from 1992 to 2015 before Newcastle took the accolade on the last two occasions as the Tyne-Wear football rivalry made its way into vote counting.

However, the 2024 general election is expected to be different with boundary changes creating an additional logistical challenge.

The expectation had been that Newcastle had fallen out of the picture with Sunderland and the Northumberland seat of Blyth and Ashington identified as potential frontrunners instead.

However, Newcastle Council officials have since revised their times while the seats of Tynemouth and Gateshead Central and Whickham have also emerged as outside candidates.

Newcastle's first declarations in 2017 and 2019 came within 90 minutes of the polls closing but officials had initially briefed that they did not expect their first result until around 1.15am on Friday morning this year.

But the situation changed last week when Newcastle City Council revised the anticipated declaration times it had been briefing on in recent weeks, with the first result expected by midnight while all three seats would now be completed by 1am.

The city council insists, as most always tend to in public, that it is not trying to declare first and that accuracy is the priority but high numbers of postal vote returns means that counting can be done more quickly on the night while waiting for other ballot boxes to arrive.

In Sunderland, there is still an expectation that they will declare early, the Houghton and Sunderland South constituency could be called around 11.30pm – which is the same estimate being given for the Blyth and Ashington seat.

The election team in Northumberland were tipped as the quickest in 2019 but the need for a recount delayed their announcement.

They could achieve the accolade this year instead and it is also known that top election administrator Bill Crawford, the man who led Sunderland’s rapid counts for years and subsequently masterminded Newcastle’s success, will be in Blyth on 4 July.

Tynemouth is another seat worth keeping a close eye on with the declaration possible before midnight.

North Tyneside’s counters were the first in the region to finalise their results in the recent mayoral and PCC elections and with the boundary changes they only have one relatively compact constituency from which they will receive ballots next week.

Even Gateshead Central and Whickham has also been mentioned as an outside bet.

While Gateshead Council has offered an official estimate of 2am for the seat, a result is thought to be likely well before then.

Similar to the situation in Tynemouth, Gateshead’s counting team has just one fairly compact constituency to deal with this year.Outside of the North East, the Essex seat of Basildon and Billericay and the Hertfordshire constituency of Broxbourne are expected to be declared at 12.15am, according to the Press Association and may be the closest challengers to the region's crown.

Only time will tell who will receive the General Election counting bragging rights once polls close on Thursday at 10pm.

Have you heard our new podcast Talking Politics? Every week Tom, Robert and Anushka dig into the biggest issues dominating the political agenda…