The local elections taking place on May 4th consist of three main categories – the metropolitan boroughs, the unitary authorities, and the district councils. I will consider what to look out for in each of these, in a series of articles published on this site on Mondays. We shall start with the metropolitan boroughs. Though it should also be noted that there are council elections in Northern Ireland and contests for directly elected mayors in Bedford, Leicester, Mansfield, and Middlesbrough.
Labour dominates in the metropolitan boroughs. In some places, notably Liverpool and Manchester, it holds an overwhelming majority of council seats. These seats were last fought in 2019. Back then, the BBC produced a “projected national vote share” which took into account all the elections that day and adjusted for places where no contests were being held. It had the Conservatives and Labour tied on 28 per cent each. That was a pretty bad result for both parties. The Brexit Party triumphed in the Euro Elections later that month but had no impact. However, independent council candidates did exceptionally well. The Lib Dems also made significant gains.
Now, Labour can certainly expect to make net gains. That would be a modest target. A higher bar would involve Labour being ahead of the Conservatives by six or seven points – enough for an overall majority in the House of Commons, had it been a general election. This would imply more than a thousand extra council seats across all the categories up for election. Yet the opinion polling would suggest they should do even better still. The polls show a wide range in the Labour lead – from at least ten points to as high as 25. By contrast, the Council by-election results, which I list on this site each week, suggest Labour’s advance will be patchy rather than dramatic.
In the metropolitan boroughs, all the seats are being contested in Bolton, Liverpool, Oldham, Stockport, Tameside, Trafford, Wigan, Wirral and Wolverhampton. In the past, Trafford was one to look out for. But Labour gained that last time. For Labour to gain overall control of Wirral would be a modest target for them.
But it is in the Black Country that will be of most electoral significance. Dudley, Sandwell and Walsall each have a third of the seats up for election. But Dudley and Walsall are Conservative councils with clear majorities. Given that only a minority of seats are up, it would be very difficult for Labour to gain control. But how many extra seats will they win? In Sandwell, the Conservatives need to make gains on the council to be on course to hold the West Bromwich constituencies at the General Election. There have been Labour splits and de-selections there which may have an impact.
Wolverhampton Council already has a clear Labour majority. But the City has a couple of Conservative MPs. So that is another key battleground. Cllr Wendy Thompson, the Leader of the Conservative Group, set out her stall on this site last week.
The Lib Dems will be looking to gain control of Stockport, where they already have a minority administration. The Lib Dems are languishing in the opinion polls but that has traditionally been a poor guide to local elections. They usually outperform by several points. But whether they can make further progress on their gains in 2019 is another matter.
The Green Party will take a particular interest in Solihull. That is a Conservative Council with a large majority and only a third of the seats up for election, but the Green Party has 14 councillors which has established them as the main challengers.
Sheffield also has only a third of seats up. The Council is hung. There is a Labour council leader but with a broad coalition of the Lib Dems and the Green Party. If Labour is really on course for a General Election landslide they shouldn’t be struggling in Sheffield. We shall see.
Then we have Sunderland. Labour did badly here in 2019 and so will be looking to regain territory lost in the Corbyn era. These are traditionally the first results to come in and so get more attention in the media. This will be especially important this time around. William Atkinson has pointed out that with the Coronation on May 6th, attention will move on quite rapidly. This will mean that the later results – such as those counting on the Friday – may get rather lost.
Conclusion
The metropolitan boroughs are mostly traditional Labour areas. But include several of the constituencies that produced startling Conservative gains in the 2019 General Election. These are the places where Labour will need to make substantial progress. Elsewhere, will Labour gains from the Conservatives be partially offset by losses to the Lib Dems and the Green Party?