{"id":143038,"date":"2023-05-10T16:07:43","date_gmt":"2023-05-10T15:07:43","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.vuelio.com\/uk\/?p=143038"},"modified":"2023-05-10T16:07:43","modified_gmt":"2023-05-10T15:07:43","slug":"local-elections-2023-wins-and-losses","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.vuelio.com\/uk\/blog\/local-elections-2023-wins-and-losses\/","title":{"rendered":"Local elections 2023: wins and losses"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Conservatives lost 1,060 seats in last week\u2019s elections, relinquishing control of 48 councils across the country. As was widely predicted, Labour made significant gains across marginal and Red Wall councils, picking up more than 500 seats. Meanwhile the Liberal Democrats swept across the Blue Wall, winning 12 councils.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Labour Leader Keir Starmer has claimed his party\u2019s performance has set them \u2018on course for a Labour majority at the next general election\u2019 with Labour now the largest party in local government, surpassing the Tories for the first time since 2002. Labour took control of authorities across the general election battleground, including High Peak, Swindon and Plymouth.<\/p>\n

At a meeting of his shadow cabinet on Tuesday, Starmer said \u2018people who turned away from us during the Corbyn years and the Brexit years are coming back\u2019. The leaders of the 22 councils won by Labour have been tasked with drawing up \u2018emergency cost-of-living plans\u2019 within their first 100 days.<\/p>\n

Labour does indeed seem to be bridging the Brexit divide, as the party made its largest gains in areas with the highest Leave vote. Many of Labour\u2019s biggest gains came in Brexit heartlands such as Stoke, Mansfield and Hartlepool. The Johnson 2019 strategy was focused on attracting Red Wall Leave voters while holding on to Blue Wall Remain voters, however, with both Brexit \u2018done\u2019 and Corbyn gone, this strategy has collapsed.<\/p>\n

Prime Minister Rishi Sunak<\/a> has described the loss of more than 1,000 councillors as \u2018disappointing\u2019 but insisted he would \u2018strain every sinew\u2019 to fulfil his pledges on the economy, NHS waiting lists and small boats. On Tuesday he insisted those pledges are \u2018the right ones\u2019 to win back voters. However, some Conservative MPs have suggested Sunak will need to do much more than reiterate those pledges in order to improve the Conservatives’ position ahead of a general election. The Conservative MP for Swindon Justin Tomlinson said the results were \u2018devastating\u2019 and should serve as a \u2018wake-up call for the party at all levels\u2019. Talking to Times Radio, he criticised the Conservatives\u2019 pitch to voters, adding it lacked a \u2018coherent message\u2019.<\/p>\n

The Conservative Tees Valley Mayor Ben Houchen, who is up for election next year, said the Conservatives\u2019 losses were in part due to \u2018the turmoil and upheaval of the last 12 months\u2019. Similarly, in Swindon, where Labour took control for the first time in 20 years, overthrown Tory council leader David Renard blamed \u2018the cost-of-living<\/a> and the performance of the Government in the last 12 months\u2019 for his party\u2019s poor results.<\/p>\n

In much of the country, it was the Liberal Democrats who benefited from the Conservatives\u2019 decline. Achieving a share of 20% \u2013 the highest since the coalition in 2010 \u2013 Lib Dem Leader Ed Davey called it their \u2018best result in decades\u2019. Davey said he would table a vote of no confidence in the Government when Parliament returns: \u2018The local elections showed that the public clearly has no confidence in Sunak or the Conservatives, so it’s time for a general election now. There’s only one reason Rishi Sunak would deny British people a say at the ballot box: because he is running scared and knows he’d lose.\u2019 However, the Lib Dems are not able to force a debate on the motion, so it is likely to end up being mainly symbolic.<\/p>\n

The Green Party gained 241 seats \u2013 their best-ever result in local elections \u2013 and gained its first majority on an English council, in Mid-Suffolk, although they were overtaken as the biggest party by Labour in Brighton and Hove.<\/p>\n

For regular updates on what is happening in UK politics and public affairs,\u00a0sign up to our weekly Point of Order newsletter<\/a>, going out every Friday morning.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Conservatives lost 1,060 seats in last week\u2019s elections, relinquishing control of 48 councils across the country. As was widely predicted, Labour made significant gains across marginal and Red Wall councils, picking up more than …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":410,"featured_media":143040,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[7383,7271],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.vuelio.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/143038"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.vuelio.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.vuelio.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vuelio.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/410"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vuelio.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=143038"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/www.vuelio.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/143038\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":143208,"href":"https:\/\/www.vuelio.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/143038\/revisions\/143208"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vuelio.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/143040"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.vuelio.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=143038"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vuelio.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=143038"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vuelio.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=143038"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}