The 2 May local elections saw the Conservatives hit their lowest number of councillors and councils controlled for a quarter of a century.
They slipped below the symbolic figure of 5,000 councillors in England and Wales and have an overall majority in just 54 out of 339 local authorities in the two countries.
This may all, of course, be inevitable for a party which has been in power nationally for so long, but it is only three years ago that they were still gaining both seats and councils.
Since then, they have lost more than 2,000 councillors and nearly 90 councils, with Labour, the Liberal Democrats, the Greens, and a range of smaller parties and Independents all benefiting.
That spread is interesting in itself.
It is clear that voters no longer think simply in terms of two parties, and the small minority (probably less than a third of the electorate this year) who do participate only serve to highlight the many more who are disengaged from or even disillusioned with politics.
With a general election just around the corner, all eyes were on Labour’s local performance. The party had shown a degree of recovery in the ‘red wall’ last year winning back councils like Mansfield, Middlesbrough, North East Derbyshire, and Stoke-on-Trent.
This time it added Hartlepool to that list, as well as depriving the Conservatives of a majority in Dudley and North East Lincolnshire.
Indeed, at ward level, it seemed that the stronger the ‘leave’ vote at the 2016 EU Referendum, the greater the switch back to Labour.
Hartlepool also provides a fascinating example of how voters choose horses for courses. Each of the three elections held across the town produced a different outcome.
In the contest for the Tees Valley mayoralty (almost the only bright spot for the government in this entire set of elections), Conservative incumbent Ben Houchen polled a majority of votes; in the Cleveland police and crime commissioner election, Labour comfortably beat the Conservatives in a two-party fight.
At the local elections, Labour won nine of the 12 seats falling vacant with the Conservatives picking up just one.
“It is clear that voters no longer think simply in terms of two parties”
With the Reform party on the ballot paper in all 12 local wards, the Conservative vote was less than half that which had been accorded to Houchen on the same visit to the ballot box! Labour’s support, by contrast, was pretty solid throughout, giving further succour to those in the party who believe its ‘red wall’ woes have largely been vanquished.
However, perhaps the most satisfying victories for Labour came in a range of councils in the Midlands and the South, which it won directly from the Conservatives.
In both Nuneaton and Bedworth, and Redditch, all-out elections following boundary changes enabled the party to make dramatic gains.
In Redditch, it scooped up 21 of the 27 seats available; in Nuneaton it won an additional 15 seats to get over the line. In Cannock Chase, where boundary changes had reduced the size of the council from 41 to 36, Labour also enjoyed double figure gains.
In Adur (Shoreham) and Rushmoor (Aldershot), Labour made history by taking control for the first time in those councils’ 50-year existence.
Adur now joins neighbouring Worthing, with whom it shares many services, and Brighton & Hove, in forming a swathe of red on the Sussex coast.
Labour also gained previously ‘hung’ Milton Keynes for the first time since 2000, and is now the largest party in the Essex Brexit strongholds of Basildon and Thurrock.
Parliamentary constituencies within all those councils, many of which Labour won during the Blair era, will now be a focus of attention during the general election campaign.
But Labour did not have it all its own way.
In the North of England, Labour lost its majority in Kirklees and in Oldham as Independents took former Labour seats in a protest over the national party’s stance on Gaza.
In Burnley and Pendle, Labour had already been diminished by the defection of sitting councillors. There are now no Labour councillors at all in Pendle.
Looking at individual wards, it seems that the Labour share of the vote was down by almost 18 points compared with 2021 in places with a Muslim population in excess of 20 per cent of the total.
In Rochdale (scene of George Galloway’s recent parliamentary by-election victory), on the other hand, Labour retained 14 of its 15 seats with Galloway’s Workers Party of Britain being successful in just two wards.
Elsewhere, Labour had already lost control in both Norwich and Oxford following policy-led resignations by sitting councillors, and in Hastings it no longer had the numbers to lead a minority administration.
In all three cases the situation could not be reversed.
In Hastings, it was the Greens who benefited from internal Labour dissension; in Oxford, the Greens again and also, perhaps ironically, a group opposed to low traffic neighbourhoods, won previously Labour seats.
For their part, the Conservatives can point to Walsall where they lost no seats and retain a big overall majority, and to their narrow success in keeping Harlow out of Labour’s hands. But they too have been damaged by intra-party strife.
In Peterborough, they had controlled the council or been the largest party throughout this century, but now find themselves in third place thanks to inroads from the Peterborough First group which contains several councillors originally elected as Conservatives.
And in Tamworth, which Labour gained, the Conservatives were similarly weakened by discord in the ranks.
The Liberal Democrats picked up more than 100 extra seats and had slightly more councillors returned overall at these elections than did the Conservatives.
They also made some notable dents in the ‘blue wall’, winning control in Dorset as well as in the mythical home of ‘disgusted of Tunbridge Wells’.
Their already large majorities in councils like Cheltenham, Woking and Winchester were enhanced, with the Conservatives wiped out in the first two cases.
The party’s representation in the LGA is now higher than at any point since the early days of its national coalition with the David Cameron-led coalition.
The Greens continued to make incremental progress.
They just fell short of a majority in Bristol, but now have 10 per cent or more of councillors in some 50 local authorities. At these elections, they seemed particularly to attract support as a left-of-centre alternative to Labour.
The Reform party contested only about one in seven of all wards and had just two councillors returned – both in Havant.
However, as in the Blackpool South parliamentary by-election and as evidenced in Hartlepool, where it was present it mostly ate into the Conservative vote.
There was also progress for Independents and, especially, avowedly non-party political candidates who stand under a label referencing a particular local ward, town or geographic area.
An extreme example of this trend was in Castle Point in Essex.
Long a stronghold of the Canvey Island Independents, the non-party campaign spread its tentacles onto the ‘mainland’ and beat the Conservatives in every seat it contested there as the People’s Independent party.
With all 39 seats now under their control, the two groups have joined together to run the council.
Results summary 2024 England*
*compared to seats won in 2021 taking boundary changes into account
| Seats | Councils | |
| Conservative | -473 | -10 |
| Labour | +186 | +8 |
| Lib Dem | +104 | +2 |
| Green | +74 | – |
| Other | +109 | +1 |
| No overall control | – | -1 |
Councils controlled (England) 2024
Con Lab Lib Dem Green Ind/Other No overall control
54 105 40 1 8 109
Councillors (England) 2024
Con Lab LD Green Ind/Other
4,862 5,789 2,950 797 1,862
*these figures have been updated due to minor inaccuracies in the earlier version of the story
