Labour's Steve Rotheram wins Liverpool metro mayoral election

The Liverpool Walton MP won nearly three times as many votes as his nearest rival

Steve Rotheram, Labour's mayor for the Liverpool City Region (Getty Images)

Labour has won the mayoralty for the newly created Liverpool City Region, it has been announced.

The party's candidate Steve Rotheram won an outright majority of votes in the first round of counting in the contest.

The Labour candidate won 171,167 votes, or 59.3 per cent of the vote – around three times the support of the next candidate.

Conservative candidate Tony Caldeira came second with 58,805 votes, 20.3 per cent of the vote; Carl Cashman of the Lib Dems won 6.8 per cent; Tom Crone of the Greens won 4.9 per cent; Paula Walters of Ukip won 4.1 per cent.

Asked what his first priority was for the mayoralty, Mr Rotheram said: "Hopefully we'll be able to take the buses back into public control but I want to raise aspiration for everyone in our city region."

Mr Rotheram, who is Jeremy Corbyn's former parliamentary private secretary, told the BBC his party leader was like "Marmite" on the doorstep. He said some voters "absolutely love him" while others did not.

The Mayor, a former bricklayer, is currently MP for Liverpool Walton and may stand down at the coming general election.

The metro mayor position for the Liverpool City Region coexists with the mayoralty of Liverpool's local authority area; this position is held by Labour's Joe Anderson.