LEFT campaigners said that today’s local election results will show how the Labour leadership has “killed hope” by continuing Tory austerity.

As polling booths opened on the warmest start to May on record, Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer’s party faces a twin challenge of council and mayoral elections across England and a by-election in Runcorn and Helsby.

Former Labour MP Mike Amesbury won the seat with 53 per cent of the vote before quitting after being convicted of punching a constituent.

But amid surging support for Reform UK, it is now expected to go down to the wire between the two parties.

People’s Assembly national secretary Ben Sellers said: “Farage is a fraud, that’s clear — a fanboy of Margaret Thatcher who presents himself as a friend of the workers. 

“However, it’s also clear that a lot of the mess Starmer and his government finds itself in is self-inflicted. 

“By continuing the Tories’ austerity and piling more misery on the poorest and most vulnerable, they’ve killed hope. 

“And when there’s no positive answers, the right inevitably fills the gap. It will be up to us to build a mass campaign for the alternative, against cuts and inequality, and against racism and the far right. 

“It will be a long road, but it can be done.” 

A Momentum spokesperson added: “By continuing austerity, pandering to the far right and failing to offer real change, the Labour leadership risks handing the country to the likes of Nigel Farage.

“It’s time for MPs, councillors, party members and the wider labour movement to speak out, oppose attacks on living standards, and demand the government change course by offering real Labour values and standing up for working-class communities.”

In a final message to voters before the polls opened, Labour chairwoman Ellie Reeves insisted that the government’s plan was “already starting to deliver.”

Mr Farage told a rally in Staffordshire on Wednesday night that the elections would see his party eclipse the Conservatives as the main opposition party in England, marking the “day that two-party politics in England dies for good.”

He predicted Reform to win “two or three” of the six mayoralties up for election.