LONDON (Reuters) -A British lawmaker who was found guilty of punching one of his constituents has said he will stand down as a member of parliament, triggering the first by-election since Prime Minister Keir Starmer’s Labour Party was elected last year.
Mike Amesbury, the member of parliament for Runcorn and Helsby in northwest England, was suspended from Labour after CCTV footage showed him punching a man in October and repeatedly hitting him after the man was knocked to the ground.
The 55-year-old was given a suspended prison sentence last month for a single count of common assault after he plead guilty to the offence.
Amesbury told the BBC he was resigning as a member of parliament “as soon as possible” and he regretted attacking the man “every moment, every day”.
A date for the election to replace him – known as a by-election – has not yet been set.
He has been a member of parliament since 2017 and comfortably won the seat last year with a majority of 14,696.
But the right-wing populist Reform UK party, led by Nigel Farage, came second with 7,662 votes and are targeting winning the seat. Bookmakers currently show Reform UK as the favourites to win the by-election.
(Reporting by Muvija M and Andrew MacAskill; Editing by Sachin Ravikumar and William James)
