Following a general election, especially one as dramatic as 4 July’s, council by-elections can provide evidence about voters in the new political environment.
Labour’s victory owed less to its own performance – barely increasing its vote share and polling half a million fewer votes than it did in 2019 – and more to a 20-point decline in Conservative support, triggering the loss of 251 seats. The Conservatives have been reduced to 121 MPs – their lowest ever total.
Sixty seats were lost to the Liberal Democrats. Reform UK and the Greens also won seats in England – five and four respectively. There were victories, too, for Independents, a rare event in parliamentary elections.
Voter volatility remains – abundantly clear at last May’s local elections when record numbers voted for candidates outside the mainstream.
Despite their best parliamentary result since the 1920s, the Liberal Democrats lost overall control of Three Rivers after defeat by the Conservatives in Abbots Langley and Bedmond ward.
The vacancy arose following the resignation of the council’s Deputy Leader, Matthew Bedford, re-elected in 2021 with more than half the votes.
A sign of an early Conservative recovery then? Not if the two results in Wychavon are examined.
In the two by-elections held there, the party’s vote fell by more than 20 points. While one was retained, the Harvington and Norton seat – vacated by Bradley Thomas after his selection and subsequent election for the Bromsgrove parliamentary constituency – fell to an Independent.
Independents and smaller parties may thrive in the immediate post-general election period.
While the Greens retained Oxford’s Marston ward, they did so by a margin of just 44 votes. The threat came from the Independent Oxford Alliance, whose website declares a desire to “bring common sense back into local politics”.
An example of such is its opposition to the council’s proposal for low traffic neighbourhoods.
Such policies, and probable changes to planning laws to assist housebuilding, will promote local-issue groups in some areas.
It was only a single vote in Caerphilly’s Aberbargoed and Bargoed ward that prevented that result from becoming Labour’s first by-election defeat, barely a month after its landslide general election victory.
So, how short is Labour’s honeymoon going to be? If the past is a guide, defeats will arrive shortly.
Since we began chronicling the ebb and flow of local votes in the early 1980s, there have been five general election landslides, with the governing party making net losses in subsequent local by-elections on three occasions.
Meanwhile, it is vital for Conservative morale that it recovers, winning in wards held by Labour and the Liberal Democrats. However, when Reform UK stands candidates, it is still attracting votes, and this will hinder Conservative progress.
More than 70 by-elections are scheduled over the next two months. They will provide important evidence about the state of electoral opinion.
By-election results
| Caerphilly, Aberbargoed and Bargoed LAB HELD 0.1% over Plaid Cymru Turnout 10.6% | Northumberland, Cramlington Eastfield CON HELD 12.0% over Lab Turnout 31.0% |
| Hertfordshire, Bedwell LAB HELD 24.0% over Con Turnout 18.4% | Oxford, Marston GREEN HELD 2.4% over Independent Oxford Alliance Turnout 39.4% |
| Islington, Hillrise LAB HELD 19.2% over Ind Turnout 20.5% | Three Rivers, Abbots Langley and Bedmond CON GAIN FROM LIB DEM 6.4% over Lib Dem Turnout 29.5% |
| Newham, Beckton LAB HELD 7.9% over Newham Independents Turnout 13.5% | Wychavon, Badsey and Aldington CON HELD 3.9% over Lib Dem Turnout 23.9% |
| Newham, Little Ilford LAB HELD 6.4% over Newham Independents Turnout 18.0% | Wychavon, Harvington and Norton IND GAIN FROM CON 17.2% over Con Turnout 32.4% |
- For additional data on these and other recent local election results, please download the by-election results excel below.