Today around 70% of the electorate can go and vote for c.a. 8,000 councillors… the biggest “mid-term” election. Basically, everywhere except the big urban centres have some sort of election today…
Towards the end of the campaign, we saw Labour commit to reinstating the 300k housing targets and building more Council homes, while the Tories relaunched their commitment for “Help to Buy” to woo younger voters. The Greens have a policy on rent controls and the LibDems are (perhaps unsurprisingly) silent on the issue altogether.
But back to the election… 230 Councils have elections today… so let’s look at some interesting facts and figures…
Seats per party before the election:
Councils controlled before the election:
Now as certain as I am writing this, there will be monumental changes. The first thing to note is a North/South divide. In the Midlands and North the battle is predominantly Tory/Labour, but in the South it is a Tory/ABC (Anything But Conservative) battle where the dominant party putting together coalitions will be the LibDems doing deals with Labour, Greens and Independents. (Don’t forget the Independents… they will do well too!)
Both Keir and Rishi need to do well… Keir to prove that he is on his way to Government and Rishi to prove that the Tories have a slim chance of surviving the next general election. And the LibDems will be celebrating their road to recovery after getting in bed with David Cameron.
I think that the Tory losses will be severe and somewhere in the region of 1/3 (1,000) seats and about half of the 82 councils they control looks set to change hands.
Labour will pick up a few hundred seats – and a good few councils – as will the LibDems. The “Red Wall” will be the red wall once again, and in the South there will be a new “Yellow/Rainbow Wall”.
The Home Counties don’t tend to vote Labour but Medway in Kent is one of the exceptions where Labour might do well in the South.
Surrey looks like it is going to be a real bun-fight with the LibDems targeting vast numbers of seats… Even Surrey Heath – Michael Gove’s own Council could go LibDem. Other places like Horsham also give the impression that the LibDems are on the way to victory.
In the North, Derby City Council looks like it is going to go Red with conviction and other places like Stoke on Trent is within their grasp, as is Middlesborough (that has been marginally Conservative for a few years now).
Last year saw Labour surprises in London with Westminster and Wandsworth, once Tory bastions, crumble.
It is going to be interesting to watch the count tonight (62 councils are counting) and the rest are counting tomorrow.
By Saturday we will see how right or wrong I was… but my problems are nothing in comparison to those in store for Rishi!
There will be an election special tomorrow and Saturday!
Until the morning!
Henry
