2023 UK Local Elections

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New Statesman/Britain Elects are out with their 2023 councilor data map and analysis - you can view it with a free limited-articles account.

https://twitter.com/BritainElects/status/1646857966656663552?s=20

Probably quite difficult to put such a map together. Aside from the sheer volume of results, it is often notoriously difficult to navigate the local elections sections on the websites of local authorities.     

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Local election night traditions to look out for ---

The tone of the night/day after being set by the first few council declarations, even if they are completely unrepresentative overall.

People on Twitter asking whether or not there will be an exit poll. They are only conducted for general elections these days.

The results programmes having panels that contain the most surreally hackish people from the parties.

The 'big moment' of John Curtice revealing what the 'projected national vote share' is.

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BBC1 is covering the results (or purporting to do so) from 11:40PM. Doesn't seem to be much coverage scheduled for the day after, as there sometimes is.

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It's also weird how much we focus on the numbers when everyone always gets pulled in by the shiny lights e.g those councils who declare first.

It's a complete guess but they could do relatively ok on headline numbers and still lose a good chunk of councils including those mirroring key likely marginals but there's a very weird failure to even understand local government.

Even the obsession with 'well these are actually elections about bins' annoys me because your council will provide a lot more important services than bin collection e.g health & safety inspections, care for children with additional needs up to aged 25, local school oversight, support for refugees and a whole host of things you don't often realise until it goes wrong (see flood defence planning in London)

They'll be some wild result with a wild swing in some ward in some obscure town that'll declare early and will set much of the tone on Twitter.

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Polling stations now open.

The anecdotes throughout the day should be more interesting than usual given the ID issue.

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https://twitter.com/hoffman_noa/status/1654155961106419717?s=20

tl;dr it's bad for the Tories everywhere and the Lib Dems in particular seem to be doing well.  

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There should be individual wards declaring in about an hour, even if it will be a few hours until an entire council count is completed.

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Silksworth and Houghton are also comfortable Labour holds.

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https://twitter.com/BritainElects/status/1654258535159529473?s=20

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The Tories have won a ward somewhere according to the BBC graphics. Not sure exactly where.

Edit: St Peter's in Sunderland.

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Lib Dems make their first gain of the night - Fulwell in Sunderland from the Tories.

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Talking about a result that indicates very little...

https://twitter.com/BritainElects/status/1654261597961953282?s=20

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West Park in South Tyneside is the first Green gain (from Labour) of the night, I think.    

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The Tories have lost control of Brentwood.

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Strong rumours that Labour are heading for a majority in Monkeyville.

Monkeyville?

Hartlepool. There's a story behind it.

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Tories lose North West Leicestershire to NOC, Labour now largest party after 8 flips.

Stoke-on-Trent has large Labour gains right now, but the pace of the count has delayed the flip result until just now. 

Bolton is slow, but Labour are gaining and on top right now.

NW Leicestershire and Tamworth might be the best results from Labour's perspective so far.

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So what's the Tory spin now? We've made gains in..... (checks notes) Harlow?

Greg Hands is going on about how there supposedly was an independent prediction of 1,000 Tory losses.

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The local elections show what I suspected - talks of a Labour MAJORITY were greatly exaggerated. A good night for Labour? Yes. But the night they needed for a majority? Unlikely. And the night they needed for a landslide? Surely not.

Too bad couldn’t have been an election after Truss was PM.

Please, kindly, shoo.

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Kinda wondering how long the British far-right is going to remain electorally collapsed, Reform and Reclaim seem to have flopped but all those BNP/UKIP voters didn't just vanish.

The actual far-right (as in the BNP, NF, UKIP in its present form etc) doesn't show any particular signs of electoral life. As for the populist hard right (Reform, UKIP in its Farage form etc), Brexit has dealt a blow (in the sense that the Leave vote was a big eff you to the establishment and elite etc, so what's the point of further eff yous?) but a future revival can't be ruled out.

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The Greens are now the largest party on Folkestone & Hythe Council, with Labour second. Not exactly a place one associates with ecological and/or socialist politics.

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Also, I think it bears mentioning that this truly was the moment the Greens entered primetime. They are set to lead just under10 more councils after these results, almost all in normally blue shires, and thats before we consider how their gains make them coalition partners in many more. Now obviously part of their strength flows from the same source as the Lib-Dems, and part is just NIMBYs but with trees which won't carry over to a GE. But one would think the Greens will learn and not run a left-of-labour campaign in 2024 when they have been mostly stagnant in those type of areas. Especially since Labour are going to be gaining votes even in the former Green targets at the same GE.

It's not commented on much by the media (because the media is mostly ignorant and stupid), but environmentalism appeals to a certain kind of small-c conservative voter as well as to the more predictable groups.

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Assuming they are not concurrent with a general election, the Tories could have a significant recovery in the polls and nonetheless lose control of every remaining ‘swing’ council in the country next year. The all-up councils up in 2025 could have, with a decent recovery and a bit of luck, not looked awful for the Tories if they were up next year. However, a bad year (2022) and a dreadful year (2023) means that council seats that were last fought in a great year (2021) are going to see massive losses no matter what next year and leave no room for spin.

If they are relatively good for the Tories then Sunak could go for a June election, a la Thatcher in both 1983 and 1987. Any kind of disaster (which is more likely) would probably ensure an election in October or November.