It is anticipated that British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak would call a general election in 2024, but political experts are becoming increasingly excited about the precise date of the announcement.

A UK parliament can sit for a maximum of five terms.

The most recent national election was held on December 12, 2019. The following election must take place by January 28, 2025, which is five years after the present parliament convened for the first time to allow for campaigning.

How do you call an election?

Sunak will most likely proceed to Buckingham Palace to formally request that King Charles III “dissolve” parliament.

By custom, the nation is then informed of the election from outside Number 10 Downing Street by the prime minister, who is the head of the largest party in parliament.

What takes place after that?

Five weeks of campaigning begin on the day of the announcement. If a sitting member of parliament decides to run for office again, they forfeit their position and become candidates.

The government is now in a “pre-election period,” formerly known as “purdah,” during which it is subject to restrictions until the next government is elected.

How are elections decided?

The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, which consists of England, Scotland, Wales, and Northern Ireland, is divided into 650 constituencies.

The “first-past-the-post” method allows voters in each to vote for a single candidate.

Each constituency or seat’s most popular candidate is chosen to represent that region in parliament.

A party forms the government and its leader becomes prime minister if it wins a majority of at least 326 seats.

The party with the most MPs typically forms a coalition with a smaller party if neither party exceeds that threshold, as the Conservatives and Liberal Democrats did in 2010.

When would Sunak decide to act?

There are three possible voting windows, according to the Institute for Government think tank: May 2024, October 2024, and January 2025.

It would be safer to hold it in May concurrently with regularly scheduled municipal elections, minimising the chance that negative polling outcomes could harm the government’s standing beforehand.

There have also been rumours that Sunak would be inclined to hold an early election in the event that right-wing Tory rebels seek to topple him for not being able to enforce his proposal to send migrants to Rwanda more strictly.

Sunak would have more time to fulfil his major promises of expanding the economy, cutting the length of the National Health Service waiting list, and halting the flow of migrants if there was an autumn election, perhaps in October to avoid conflicting with the US election.

Additionally, Sunak would serve as prime minister for about two years, which is a lot longer than eighteen months and might mean something to him.

January is most likely the least likely of the three options because winter elections are uncommon in the UK and a campaign around the Christmas season would hardly be well-liked by candidates or voters.

But in the end, Sunak will go with whatever he believes has the highest chance of working out.

Who is the most likely to win?

For well over a year now, the Conservatives, who have been in power since 2010, have regularly lagged the main opposition Labour Party by double digits in the majority of opinion polls.

Rather than overwhelming support for Labour, this is largely because of the biggest cost-of-living crisis in decades and Tory infighting, which has produced five prime ministers since the 2016 Brexit referendum.

Keir Starmer, the leader of Labour, is therefore the favourite to succeed Prime Minister.

But a lot may happen to tighten the race with well over a year until election day.

The Tories may believe that the lack of support for either leader among voters is their best opportunity, since a “hung parliament” would occur if no party wins a majority.