Local elections 2022: Lib Dems make gains as Partygate hits Tories and Labour admits ‘mixed picture’– live updates

Another disappointed Conservative has blamed Partygate and the failings of Boris Johnson’s leadership for the party’s poor showing in local elections.

Following similar remarks from Tory leaders in Cumberland and Worcester, the leader of Portsmouth council Simon Bosher said the leadership in Westminster needed to “take a good, long hard look in the mirror” to find out why he had lost four seats tonight.

“There is a degree of anger and a degree of frsutration,” at the situation in Westminster, he said.

Taking control of Hull council from Labour has been the stand-out prize on a very good night for the Lib Dems, who have also won seats from the Conservatives in the south.

Liberal Democrat peer Baroness Kramer said she was “obviously delighted” her party had taken control of Hull council, where the party had haboured “high hopes” of victory and the Tories lost their only remianing seat.

“It is a community that in a sense has been taken for granted frankly by both Labour and Conservatives,” she told Sky News.

She said that “big significant local issues” like the number of GPs locally came up on the doorstep, as well as the cost of living and Partygate.

“It is not just partygate, it is everything it stands for, this sort of whole sense of a Government in moral collapse,” Lady Kramer said.

After results from 31 councils, the Tories had a net loss of 3 seats, Labour had a net gain of 13 seats, the Lib Dems had put on 21 seats and gained one authority while the Greens had gained seven seats.

More analysis on the results so far from Will Jennings, a professor of politics at the University of Southampton.

He points out that comparing results from the around 150 wards where there is data from the 2016 Brexit vote, Conservatives are doing better in Leave voting areas and Labour better in Remain voting areas.

He also points out that the Conservatives appear to be performing poorly in areas where there are fewer university graduates.

Local Tory leader blames Cumberland collapse on Boris Johnson

Archie Bland

Latest election results from the BBC, showing Labour has lost two councillors overall while the Conservatives have lost 46. The Lib Dems are up 25 while the Greens are up 16.

Labour are on track to take control of Southampton from the Conservatives, according to polling expert John Curtice, who has calculated a seven percentage point swing to Labour after a third of wards reported results.

He told the BBC:

This is one of the few councils that the Tories appear to be at serious risk of losing.

Here are some photographs from some of the counts across the country:

Another update from Barnet, where Labour are hoping to gain control from the Tories, who have run the council since 2002. Prior to that the council had either been held by the Conservatives or under no overall control since its creation in the 1960s.

Sounding negative about his party’s chances of retaining control, the Conservative leader of the council Daniel Thomas has told the BBC he’s “disappointed but proud of our track record over the last 20 years”.

If Labour are making gains … this is multiple factors and a perfect storm of 12 years of Conservative national government and 20 years of a Conservative council, and cost of living.

He also blamed the rise in National Insurance last month.

Labour has won a convincing majority on the newly created council of Cumberland “surpassing all expectations” for the party and giving the Conservatives a “devastating night”, BBC correspondent Robert Cooper reports.

As ITV’s Tom Sheldrick points out, all three local MPs are Conservatives.

London mayor Saddiq Khan has arrived at the count in Wandsworth, where Labour have so far won some key wards and there have been some big smiles in the Labour camp – and long faces on the Conservative side.

A quick reminder: if Labour take control it will be first time since 1974. The Tory majority shrank to six in 2018, its smallest since 1982.

And some more analysis from polling expert John Curtice, who has told the BBC that while the Lib Dems may be stealing headlines and Labour’s progress has been “limited”, it is “the Conservatives have lost considerable ground since 12 months ago”.

With well over 150 key wards now declared, the Conservatives are down by 3 percentage points on their performance the last time these areas were contested in 2018, Labour is down 1 point, and the Liberal Democrats are up 4 points.

If we compare the results with last year, then Labour is up 4 points, the Tories are down 6 points, and the Liberal Democrats are up 3 points.

So while the Liberal Democrats have so far stolen some of the headlines and Labour’s advance has been limited, it’s still the case that the Conservatives have lost considerable ground since 12 months ago.

A bit more analysis from Manchester University politics professor Rob Ford, who says that as yet it’s hard to interpret what the results so far mean for Labour and the Conservatives.

“So far it looks like a messy ‘choose your own adventure’ set of results for Con vs Lab,” he tweets.

On the other hand, he points out, it’s been a great night so far for the Lib Dems and the Greens.

James Johnson, a Downing Street pollster under Theresa May, has been challenging political commentary tonight that suggests Labour has failed to win back the “red wall”.

In a Twitter thread he wrote:

Change in these elections is on 2018. In 2018, Labour *had* the Red Wall nationally. Labour standing still or even going back slightly in Red Wall areas in these elections *is* progress for Labour.

Where Labour is struggling and going back further – just as they were in 2018 – is in areas like Amber Valley and Nuneaton. We are not seeing by any stretch of the imagination a seismic recovery for Labour. But much of ‘Red Wall’ commentary is wrong tonight.