Labour suffers heavy local losses

Labour has suffered heavy losses in the local elections in England and Wales.

Gordon Brown's party had lost 331 seats by Friday night, including control of key councils such as Reading and Southampton.

The Conservatives had gained 256 councillors, taking control of 12 councils to give them a total of 63.

The Liberal Democrats have so far gained 34 seats and one council.

Labour, which lost control of a net nine councils, was set to be pushed into third place with a national share of just 24 per cent, its lowest level for at least 40 years.

The Conservatives were set to achieve around 44 per cent, with the Lib Dems in second place on 25 per cent.

David Cameron's party gained control of councils including Bury and Harlow, key swing seats in any general election, as well as taking Nuneaton and Bedworth from Labour, West Lindsey from the Lib Dems and Elmbridge, Maidstone and Wyre Forest from no overall control.

Labour suffered serious setbacks in Wales, losing control of the former strongholds of Merthyr Tydfil and Blaenau Gwent.

The Greens beat the Lib Dems to become the main opposition in Norwich, just two seats behind Labour.

And the British National Party gained eight seats - two each in Rotherham, Nuneaton and Bedworth and Amber Valley and one in Pendle and Thurrock.

In total, there were 3,920 seats up for grabs, spread across 159 local authorities, including 22 in Wales where one third of the seats, 1,262, were being fought.

The English seats were being contested in 36 metropolitan councils, 78 districts and 23 unitary councils.

This included four new unitary authorities in Chester City and Cheshire West, Durham, East Cheshire and Northumberland, where full councils were being elected.

• Email Story
• IM Story
• Printable View
• Blog This
• Post a Comment

Recommend this article

Sponsored Links

(What’s this?)