Túrin Turambar wrote: ↑Sat May 08, 2021 12:25 am
At the time I'm writing this, the Conservatives have gained 173 council seats, Labour has lost 164, the Lib Dems have lost 28, the Greens have gained 50, UKIP has lost 2, and others have lost 89 (
link).
A disastrous result for Labour?
Túrin Turambar wrote:My reading:
Incumbents have done well worldwide during the COVID crisis, which would have benefited the Conservatives.
Labour lost Hartlepool, which it has held for 60 years (since the constituency was created). It is only the second time in recorded memory a government has made a gain in a by-election. This is more than a Covid-19 "bounce". The Conservatives turned a 3,000 vote deficit into a 7,000 majority on a turn out that was 2/3rds of the General Election.
The Conservative Government has settled Brexit, which would have gained it support while costing support for the Lib Dems (who did well last time as the anti-Brexit party).
The Lib Dem vote has been moribund since the decision to go into coalition with the Conservatives in 2010. The LibDems have always performed strongest locally. However, that has not been the case for a while (since 20120...). Nobody knows what the LibDems stand for. The same is of Labour under Starmer.
The Labour left is angry at the treatment of Jeremy Corbyn, which might explain the shift to the Greens.
Large numbers of the Labour left have... left. The treatment of Corbyn deserves a thread of its own!
Many natural Labour voters now feel homeless. Starmer stood for election to leader on a "Corbynist" platform. He reneged once elected. The (ex) members aren't stupid. Neither is the electorate those (ex) members are a part of.