LONDON (AP) — The Conservative Party in Britain is facing significant losses as the results of local elections come in, adding pressure on Prime Minister Rishi Sunak ahead of the upcoming U.K. general election. The Labour Party, the main opposition, seems increasingly likely to return to power after 14 years, based on current trends.
Labour has gained control of councils in England that it hasn't held for decades, and it also won a special by-election for Parliament. However, in areas with large Muslim populations like Oldham in northwest England, the party appears to have faced challenges due to leader Keir Starmer's strong pro-Israel stance in the Gaza conflict.
A key victory for Labour was winning Blackpool South, a seat in northwest England that had been Conservative since the last general election in 2019, when Boris Johnson secured a significant victory. Labour's Chris Webb secured 10,825 votes, 7,607 more than the second-placed Conservative candidate, in a contest triggered by the resignation of a Conservative lawmaker following a lobbying scandal.
"This seismic win in Blackpool South is the most important result today," Starmer said. “This is the one contest where voters had the chance to send a message to Rishi Sunak’s Conservatives directly, and that message is an overwhelming vote for change."
While these local elections are important in themselves for deciding local governance, they are also viewed through a national prism due to the impending general election. The early results indicate a significant shift, with the Conservatives losing around half of the seats they are defending, according to John Curtice, a professor of politics at the University of Strathclyde.
"We are probably looking at certainly one of the worst, if not the worst, Conservative performances in local government elections for the last 40 years," Curtice told BBC radio.
The results will continue to come in, but Sunak hopes to point to successes, especially in key mayoral races, to counter speculation that the Conservative Party might change its leader again before the main election, which could be held as soon as next month.
Sunak could potentially preempt any leadership challenge by calling an early general election, which must take place before January 2025. He has indicated that the election will likely be in the second half of 2024.
Sunak became prime minister in October 2022 after Liz Truss's short tenure, who left office after 49 days following a budget of unfunded tax cuts that unsettled financial markets. Since taking office, Sunak has struggled to change the political landscape, with Labour consistently leading in opinion polls by around 20 percentage points, indicating a potential landslide victory similar to Tony Blair's in 1997 if those polls hold true in a general election.