We have a new Prime Minister – and although local elections will be nowhere near the top of her burgeoning agenda, seasoned observers know that the weekly results from up and down the country can be leading indicators of the ebb and flow of political fortunes.
In that context, it is clearly not good news for Liz Truss that the Conservatives lost all eight council seats they defended over the past month.
In some cases, local factors were to the fore. In the Preesall ward of Wyre Council, for example, where the Conservatives had topped the poll at every election since 1976, controversy over the siting of a gravel quarry played into the hands of one of the Independent candidates.
By contrast, the contests in Cannock Chase and in Redditch (including a Worcestershire County Council vacancy) featured a more traditional two-party battle, with clear swings to Labour, leading to three gains for Sir Keir Starmer’s party.
The Hednesford North ward and the Arrow Valley West division do trend towards Labour when the party is competitive, but Redditch‘s Headless Cross and Oakenshaw ward had previously been won by the Conservatives ever since its creation in 2004.
Labour also gained a seat following the resignation of an Independent in the wonderfully named Foggy Furze ward in ‘red wall’ Hartlepool. This marks a further step towards the reinstatement of ‘normal’ party politics there, after many years of factionalism and splits.
Elsewhere, there were ominous signs for the Conservatives that both selective party competition and tactical voting might see them caught in a pincer movement by whichever opponent is best placed to defeat them.
In Beverley Rural, in the East Riding of Yorkshire, the Green party did not stand, despite polling quite strongly in both 2015 and 2019. That decision helped pave the way for a Liberal Democrat gain.
In West Sussex, on the other hand, the Liberal Democrats appear to have stood aside in the Barnham ward of Arun District Council, the better to improve the chances of the Greens – who had finished second to the Conservatives and taken a seat in this three-member ward in 2019.
In the neighbouring West Sussex division of Felpham, neither the Liberal Democrats nor the Greens fielded a candidate. This undoubtedly helped Independent Jaine Wild, a local parish councillor and anti-fox hunting campaigner, over the line in a division that UKIP had won in 2013.
Of course, this is not yet on anything like the scale Tony Blair and Paddy Ashdown managed to encourage in the run-up to the 1997 General Election, which left the Conservatives in overall control of scarcely a dozen councils across Britain, compared with 200 for Labour and 50 for the Liberal Democrats.
But they are warning shots, with the Conservatives likely to lose their leadership of the LGA following next May’s extensive local elections if things don’t pick up.
Local by-elections
| local by-elections |
|---|
| Arun, Barnham GREEN GAIN FROM CON 9.4% over Con Turnout 21.3% |
| Cambridge, Trumpington LIB DEM HELD 26.7% over Lab Turnout 27.3% |
| Cannock Chase, Hednesford North LAB GAIN FROM CON 8.1% over Ind Turnout 14.4% |
| Chesterfield, Hollingwood and Inkersall LAB GAIN FROM IND 4.6% over Ind Turnout 26.8% |
| East Riding of Yorkshire, Beverley Rural LIB DEM GAIN FROM CON 25.4% over Con Turnout 29.2% |
| Hartlepool, Foggy Furze LAB GAIN FROM IND 5.2% over Con Turnout 15.8% |
| Lancaster, Warton GREEN GAIN FROM CON 41.1% over Con Turnout 40.5% |
| Redditch, Headless Cross and Oakenshaw LAB GAIN FROM CON 4.4% over Con Turnout 28.2% |
| West Sussex, Felpham IND GAIN FROM CON 3.8% over Con Turnout 19.2% |
| Worcestershire, Arrow Valley West LAB GAIN FROM CON 18.0% over Con Turnout 15.8% |
| Wyre, Preesall IND GAIN FROM CON 6.6% over Con Turnout 33.9% |