Curtice: Results highlight deep trouble for Conservatives

The results of Thursday’s local elections that were counted overnight make difficult reading for the Conservatives.

Some losses were inevitable. Most of the seats being elected yesterday were previously contested in May 2021. Then, the Conservatives were six points ahead of Labour in the national polls. Now they are 20 points behind.

But the scale of their losses so far will worry the Conservatives. In the overnight counts, they have lost half of the council seats they were trying to defend.

If that trend continues when most of the rest of the results are declared today, the final tally could prove to be 500 losses.

Not least of the reasons why the party’s losses are proving to be so high is that the party is losing ground most heavily in wards where it was previously strongest; while Labour have been advancing most strongly in wards where they started off second to the Conservatives.

Even more discouragingly for the Conservatives, the results confirm the message of the opinion polls that the party has failed to close the gap on Labour over the last 12 months.

Last year’s local election results were also bad for the Conservatives. And in a sample of wards where the BBC has collected the detailed voting figures, Conservative support is down two points on last year, while Labour’s tally has been edging up.

Meanwhile, the Conservatives suffered another serious reverse in the Blackpool South parliamentary by-election. The party’s support fell by as much as 32.1 points, the third biggest ever drop in Conservative support in a by-election.

Much of the damage to the Conservatives’ fortunes in Blackpool appears to have been done by Reform, whose 17% of the vote is the party’s best result yet in a by-election. Reform’s support is also up on last year in the council elections, mostly it seems at the Conservatives’ expense, although the party only stood in one in six wards.

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Labour will take the results so far as further evidence that voters are looking for a change of government – not least in parts of Britain that voted heavily for Brexit in 2016.

The party gained Hartlepool, where famously it lost a parliamentary by-election to Boris Johnson three years ago. Meanwhile its support rose by 21 points in heavily Eurosceptic Blackpool, a performance well in line with the party’s performance in other recent by-elections.

There are though signs that Labour may have fallen back somewhat in places where many people identify as Muslim. This is most likely a reflection of their discontent with Labour’s stance on the war in Gaza. On average, the party’s support is down by eight points since last year in wards where more than 10% of people identify as Muslim.

The Liberal Democrats have, however, had only a modest night. While their support is up by two points on 2021, it seems to be a couple of points down on their performance last year.

There is little sign of the Liberal Democrats being able to persuade Labour supporters to make a tactical switch to them to help defeat the local Conservative incumbent. Securing such tactical support is a vital part of Sir Ed Davey’s general election strategy.

The Greens, however, do have some cause for celebration. Not only have they gained seats, but their vote is up on last year. Indeed the party may end up being slightly ahead of their previous best local election performance in 2019.

But the big message from the local ballot boxes so far is that the Conservatives remain in deep electoral trouble.

John Curtice is Professor of Politics, University of Strathclyde, and Senior Fellow, National Centre for Social Research and ‘The UK in a Changing Europe’. He is also co-host of the Trendy podcast. Analysis by Patrick English, Stephen Fisher, Robert Ford and Albert Ward.