Just gone 8am and 62 council results in, out of 230. First impression is that it is a bad result for the Tories. Labour are probably privately disappointed whilst the LibDems and Greens will be happy – although they always seem to do better in local elections. The Green Party is building an influence but until they are winning councils they stand little hope of a breakthrough in a GE.
3pm and nearly half results are declared. Labour up 222, Tories down 374, LD up 91 and Greens up 87. Very good results for last 2 – very bad for Tories and only good, not very good for Labour.
North Somerset results will be out later. North Somerset results = hung council with I think C-13, Lab-10, Ind 11, LibD 9, Green 7. My to councillors are now Green. Turnout was 32.5% which I assume is low?
I suppise the statistic of the share of the votes will be interesting as there is little evidence of tactical voting at this level.
Lessons to be learnt. Conservatives – things have to change to win back the middle ground. Their policies are too right wing for many – maybe they need to stop fearing the Reform Party (UKIP). Labour needs to get its policies out and aired widely to win voters, and stop fearing the tory right. LibDems are making headway but like Labour are basically an unknown quality so far. The Greens policies – I have no idea if they have them or not! They also need to capitalise on the huge environmental problems facing us all. Turnout is thjought to be lowish but not markedly down to be able to say that the voter ID had a major impact.
The RWPress will be able to bury the results in the Coronation farce.
Councils have had their budgets cut so have little room for manoeuvre even if a new party takes over. And do people actually care – only the Green Party put leaflets through the door (2) and the rest nothing. So what were people voting for? Democracy is only effective with participation by the majority.