Newington's Chris Peacock assesses Labour's next move following the Party's disappointing showing last week
There are three key headlines from the local, county and mayoral elections which took place last Thursday; success for the Conservatives, failures for Labour and complete obliteration for UKIP. Theresa May will have come away from the election results the happiest of all the political leaders. The national Labour Party will now be looking at where it performed well to determine whether there is any way of replicating this limited success elsewhere in the country and avoiding the heavy electoral defeat currently predicted on June 8.
The biggest worry for Theresa May following these results is the general public thinking that it is now inevitable that the Conservatives will win with a huge majority. It isn’t a surprise that we are seeing the Prime Minister playing down the potential for a landslide victory, and talking up the danger of Labour performing better than expected. It’s a sorry state of affairs for the Labour Party that this is Mrs May’s biggest worry after a set of local elections which took place after seven years of the Conservatives in government.
Why? The polls haven’t looked this good for a Conservative majority for at least a couple of generations - the last thing that Theresa May will want is Conservative voters, and the considerable number of former Labour and UKIP voters who are looking likely to vote for her, to think that the election is already won and they therefore don’t need to go out to vote. Whilst she is seemingly looking at a considerable victory, with new Conservative MPs representing former Labour heartlands across the country, it will hardly help her credibility or arguments about having a mandate if the turnout is historically low.
The glimmer of light for the Labour Party, albeit slim, was the success of Andy Burnham and Steve Rotheram in Greater Manchester and the Liverpool City Region respectively. Whilst both went into Election Day expecting success, neither would have expected such a comprehensive victory. These were the victories that Jeremy Corbyn wanted to focus on in the aftermath of Thursday, despite losing over 380 councillors across the country, with his supporters hastily organising a celebratory rally with Andy Burnham in Manchester. However, amongst the smiles and red flags around the embattled leader of the opposition, Andy Burnham was nowhere to be seen. Had Andy chosen not to attend? Was he already on Mayoral duties elsewhere in the city? Was he in the pub? Rumours flew about social media with Andy Burnham later clarifying that he hadn’t snubbed his leader but had a prior engagement, however believable that may be for the media or for voters for that matter.
A constant in both Andy Burnham’s and Steve Rotheram’s campaigns were that neither focused on national political issues and both ignored mentioning Jeremy Corbyn wherever possible. Their focus on anti-London politics and “Northern Labour” clearly worked with huge support for both candidates coming out across the two sub-regions. However, following John McDonnell’s assertion that Corbyn will be more, not less, visible in the General Election campaign following Thursday’s results, to the dismay of moderate MPs across the country, it is highly likely that local candidates, not just in the North West, but across the UK, will look at these two successful campaigns and try to replicate them for their own elections in hope for similar results.
For more detailed analysis of the local elections, or the Labour Party’s likely campaign leading up to the General Election, please contact Pavitar Mann at [email protected].
