Labour defeats UKIP leader Paul Nuttall in Stoke-on-Trent Central by-election

“This city will not allow itself to be divided by the referendum… or by race or faith or creed.

“Those who came to Stoke-on-Trent to stoke hate and division and turn us against our neighbours, I have one simple message: you have failed…

“We have said with one voice that hate and bigotry is not welcome here.”

Nuttall stormed out of the count without making a concession speech.

His defeat follows a bruising campaign in which the UKIP leader admitted that claims made on his website that he had lost “close personal friends” in the Hillsborough disaster were false.

Labour sources suggest that Nuttall’s decision to stand and label the seat the “capital of Brexit” had helped them secure victory.

Snell successfully labelled Nuttall as having been “parachuted in” to the seat — a charge that was aided by reports that Nuttall was not living in the Stoke property he listed on his nomination forms as well as an incident in which he failed to name the six towns that make up Stoke.

The result puts Nuttall’s future in jeopardy just months into the job, after former leader Nigel Farage suggested last week that victory in Stoke was “absolutely fundamental” to UKIP’s future.

Nuttall’s defeat also throws doubts on the long-term future of the party post-Brexit. The UKIP leader had hoped to remodel the party as the successors to Labour in their English heartlands.

Despite winning, Labour’s vote share of 37% was two per cent down on their 2015 general election result under Tristram Hunt. The Conservative vote also went up by almost two per cent, only the sixth time since 1970 that a governing party has managed to increase their vote share in a by-election.