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Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer holds five-month-old Hazel as he joins party members in Chatham, Kent, where Labour has taken overall control of Medway Council for the first time since 1998 after winning 30 of its 59 seats in the local elections, May 5, 2023
LABOUR’S “fantastic” local election results show the party is on course for Downing Street, Sir Keir Starmer claimed today while Tory Prime Minister Rishi Sunak attempted to remain defiant despite heavy losses.
The Labour leader told jubilant supporters that they are heading towards a Westminster majority after Thursday’s polls in many parts of England saw the official opposition seize Swindon, Stoke-on-Trent, Plymouth, Medway and other key battlegrounds.
But polling expert Professor Sir John Curtice warned the “jury is still out” on whether the party is making enough progress to win outright at the next general election, expected in 2024.
Starmer struggles to save leadership amid polling calamity
STEPHEN ARNELL examines whether Starmer is a canny strategist playing a longer game or heading for MacDonald’s Great Betrayal, tracing parallels between today’s rightward drift and the 1931 crisis
