Steve Rotheram wins third term as mayor of Liverpool City Region

Mr Rotheram secured 183,932 votes, ahead of Ms Marsden, who received 27,708, and Mr Crane, who got 26,417.

Liberal Democrats’ Rob McAllister-Bell was fourth with 21,366 votes and independent Ian Smith came last with 11,032.

Accepting the victory, Mr Rotheram said the people of Liverpool City Region had “just spoken, they have hollered loud and clear”.

“They have two messages – to the government, ‘enough is enough’, and locally, ‘Labour is delivering’,” he said.

“The road to Downing Street runs through transformative Labour administrations in local and regional government.

“With Labour in Westminster, we will get to see what real devolution is like, not the limited decentralisation we are seeing now.”

He added that Mr Sunak was “squatting in Downing Street” and needed to call a general election.

This was the first time people in the region have voted for a mayor using first-past-the-post method.

Previously, the supplementary vote system was used where voters could pick a first and second choice of candidate.

The turnout was 23.7% with 272,721 votes cast.