Local elections 2023: Early results see Labour and Lib Dems win key target areas

Early results in local elections in England have seen Labour and the Liberal Democrats gain key councils at the expense of the Conservatives.

Labour won control in Plymouth, Medway and Stoke-on-Trent – a former Labour stronghold which saw Tory MPs win in the 2019 general election.

The Lib Dems won Windsor and Maidenhead, an area which includes the constituency of ex-Tory PM Theresa May.

The Conservatives have so far lost majorities in 10 councils.

Only a minority of councils counted overnight and most results will not be confirmed until later on Friday.

The vote is the first big test of Rishi Sunak’s electoral popularity since he became prime minister.

The polls for more than 8,000 council seats on 230 councils, and four mayors, across England closed on Thursday.

Conservatives have acknowledged disappointment at the early results but noted that only 25% of councils have declared results so far.

Initial results suggest Labour are making steady if not overwhelming gains, but the party says it is making good progress in the areas it needs in order to win the next general election.

Responding to the overnight results, Mr Sunak said it was disappointing to lose Conservative councillors but added that his party was making progress in “key election battlegrounds” like Peterborough, Sandwell and Bassetlaw.

“I’m not detecting any massive groundswell of movement towards the Labour Party or excitement for their agenda,” he said.

Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer travelled to Medway to celebrate his party’s victory in the Kent council with local activists. “You didn’t just get it over the line, you blew the doors off,” he told the crowd.

He said Labour had won in the key battlegrounds and were “on course” to win a majority at the next general election.

Liberal Democrat Leader Sir Ed Davey told the BBC he had a “Cheshire-cat” grin on his face following what he said had been a “ground-breaking night” for his party.

The Green Party is hoping to win outright control of its first council in Mid Suffolk. Party co-leader Carla Denyer said her party were benefitting from “a deep dislike of the Tories and Starmer’s uninspiring Labour”.

The first gain of a council went to Labour, who took control in Plymouth, where no party previously had a majority.

Later in the night, the party celebrated other victories including taking Medway, a council the Conservatives had held for more than 20 years.

Results will continue to be declared throughout Friday, including three mayoral contests in Bedford, Leicester and Mansfield.

In Middlesbrough, Labour’s Chris Cooke became mayor beating the incumbent candidate.

Elections are not taking place in London, Scotland or Wales. Council elections in Northern Ireland have been moved back to Thursday 18 May because of the Coronation of King Charles III on Saturday.

Conclusions drawn must be done so with caution; caution because of the volume of results still to come, and caution because it can be crude to instantly transpose local election results to imagine a general election picture.

But there is often a correlation between performance at local elections and national ones. 

It has, without question so far, been a miserable series of results for the Conservatives. “A wake up call” as one minister put it.

Labour reckon these results show they are “on track to win the next general election”.

But some analysts are sceptical the numbers are that good for Labour – given the colossal mountain they face to get Keir Starmer into Downing Street and the Tories take comfort from that.

The broadest sleep-deprived smiles this morning belong to Liberal Democrats.

But remember, we are not even close to the half way point in these results so far.

Ahead of Thursday’s vote, the Conservative Party sought to manage expectations, with party chairman Greg Hands suggesting his party could lose 1,000 council seats.

Labour has enjoyed a significant lead in the opinion polls but has also been downplaying expectations, saying it expected to gain around 400 seats.

Most of the seats up for election were last contested in 2019, a tumultuous time for the two leading parties.

Then, the Conservatives lost a total of 1,330 seats in mostly traditionally Tory-supporting areas. Labour lost 84 seats – just over 4% of its councillors in those areas.

The main beneficiaries then were the Liberal Democrats and independent candidates.

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In Thursday’s elections, newly-introduced rules meant voters needed to show some form of ID.

The Electoral Commission, which oversees elections in the UK, said the election had been “well run” overall but some people had been unable to cast their vote and the impact of new voter ID rules needed to be evaluated.

The Electoral Reform Society, which opposed the change, said there had been “countless examples” of would-be voters being turned away from polling station because of the new rules.

The BBC has not been able to verify the number of voters turned away because of the new rules. But figures for this are expected to emerge in the coming days.

Most of the councils up for election in England are district councils, responsible for services including bin collections, parks, public housing and planning applications.

The rest of the councils being elected are a mixture of metropolitan and unitary councils – single local authorities that deal with all local services.

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