Skip to main content

Local elections were a disaster for the Tories – and bad news for Labour

Local elections were a disaster for the Tories – and bad news for Labour
After 14 years of Tory rule there's little enthusiasm for Starmer and his menu of reheated Thatcherism, writes CLAUDIA WEBBE

LAST WEEK’S local election results were widely and rightly portrayed as a disaster for the Conservatives and a sign that Britain is desperate for change.

Rishi Sunak’s party lost more than half the seats it was trying to hold, along with a slew of councils and mayoral contests — and lost heavily even in mayoral contests it managed to defend, such as Tees Valley. But in fact, the Tories only went backward slightly in terms of overall vote share compared to their already-poor performance, with “national equivalent vote” predictions putting the Tories on 27 per cent. 

But while the results showed clearly that British voters want change, there was no landslide to Labour. While Keir Starmer’s party picked up seats, according to political scientist John Curtice, the party went backwards compared to a year ago and recent polling giving Labour as much as 47 per cent of the Westminster vote turned into a projected 34 per cent when voters went to the actual ballot box, just 7 per cent ahead of the Tories. On the equivalent measure, Tony Blair’s Labour was more than 20 points ahead of the Tories in 1995, before the 1997 general election landslide.

Support the Morning Star
You have reached the free limit.
Subscribe to continue reading.
More from this author
Features / 10 March 2025
10 March 2025
With trade wars backfiring, allies resisting military demands, and approval ratings plummeting, Trump’s dangerous pursuit of colonial ambitions threatens to end the ‘American century’ with catastrophic conflict, warns CLAUDIA WEBBE
Features / 24 February 2025
24 February 2025
Labour is deliberately continuing Tory policies that cost us £38 billion more than they save while driving illness rates higher — despite the evidence that previous sanctions doubled suicide attempts, writes CLAUDIA WEBBE
Features / 10 February 2025
10 February 2025
The Labour Party, once the proud architect of our health service, has become its undertaker, argues CLAUDIA WEBBE
Features / 29 January 2025
29 January 2025
What we are seeing now in the policing of Gaza protests is a manifestation of an authoritarianism that the government intends to inflict on our country, argues CLAUDIA WEBBE
Similar stories
Features / 21 August 2024
21 August 2024
The more Starmer’s government demonstrates its inability to offer real change, the more its chances of securing a second term diminish, warns MICK WHITLEY
Features / 15 July 2024
15 July 2024
Labour’s low-vote landslide was enabled by the far right and opens the door wider to fascism, argues CLAUDIA WEBBE
Opinion / 10 July 2024
10 July 2024
by Radhika Desai, Alan Freeman and Carlos Martinez
Britain / 3 May 2024
3 May 2024