First things first, Rishi Sunak has survived his ‘May Day from hell’ and will lead the Conservatives into the next election.
Tory plotters who had hoped to use the local elections to topple him have thrown in the towel and conceded they do not have the numbers to oust him. By lunchtime today, those who had threatened the Prime Minister with a ‘grid of s***’ had locked it away in a filing cabinet and gone to the pub.
But if the good news for Mr Sunak is that he is almost certainly safe until the election, the bad news is that today’s results suggest he is also almost certain to lose it.
The Conservatives are on track to lose around half of the council seats they were defending this week – a result which would be at the very worst end of expectations.
Rishi Sunak is almost certainly safe until the general election, writes Jason Groves, but today’s results suggest he is almost certain to lose it
They have lost to Labour in a string of areas which are likely to be critical swing seats at the General Election, such as Thurrock and Redditch. Labour also seized back control of Hartlepool – the Red Wall seat where the Conservatives won a sensational by-election at the height of Boris Johnson‘s popularity.
And, ominously for many southern Tories, Labour also took control in the Hampshire district of Rushmoor, home to the British Army, and a council the Conservatives have run since New Labour’s heyday in 2000.
At his North Yorkshire home, Mr Sunak is now represented by a Labour mayor. At his country pile in the Cotswolds, David Cameron has a Lib Dem councillor.
The elections expert Sir John Curtice said the overall results were ‘not far short of catastrophic’ for the Conservatives and could yet prove to be their worst performance for 40 years.
Equally worrying for Tory high command was their performance in the Blackpool South by-election, which was triggered by yet another Conservative sleaze scandal. Losing to Labour on the back of a whopping 26 per cent swing was bad enough.
But senior figures are just as alarmed by the performance of Reform, who came within a whisker of relegating the Tories into third place as they recorded their best ever by-election result and Conservative support collapsed.
In council seats where they stood, Reform appeared to have depressed the Conservative vote without ever threatening to make a significant breakthrough of their own. No wonder senior Tories like Dame Andrea Leadsom are publicly calling on the PM to ‘bring back our Reform voters’.
Dame Andrea Jenkyns – a longtime critic of Mr Sunak – went further, urging the PM to bring back Boris Johnson as Tory chairman as part of a wider Cabinet reshuffle aimed at tilting the government’s top team to the Right.
There are some straws for Mr Sunak to clutch at. If the plotters really have downed tools then perhaps Conservative MPs might – finally – have a go at presenting a united face to the electorate.
In the Tees Valley, Ben Houchen threw a grateful Prime Minister a lifeline by hanging on as mayor in a contest which Labour had chucked the kitchen sink at.
Tory hopes were also rising that Andy Street might pull off a remarkable win in the West Midlands, allowing the PM to claim that the Conservatives are still competitive in a region that is packed with swing seats.
But the truth is that both men played down their Conservative affiliation and campaigned on their local records. Mr Houchen’s victory also masks a 16 per cent swing to Labour, which would be enough to deliver every parliamentary seat to Sir Keir Starmer if it were repeated at the general election.
Sir Keir Starmer celebrates the victory of Labour MP Chris Webb who seized the Blackpool South from the Conservative Party
The Prime Minister inspects the Passing Out Parade of the Parachute Regiment as he visits the Helles Barracks in north Yorkshire today
Labour will be more concerned about their failure to break through in the Essex swing seat of Harlow, where Sir Keir made a campaign visit this week. Tory victory there suggests there may still be some life in the Conservative Party in electorally important parts of the country.
It is also clear that Sir Keir has a Gaza problem. Analysis today suggests Labour support was 8 per cent lower in wards where the Muslim population is 10 per cent or more of the total.
In Oldham, Labour lost control of the council as Muslim voters punished Sir Keir for his initial equivocation over calls for a ceasefire in Gaza. Labour sources also suggested that disaffected Muslim voters could end up making the difference in the West Midlands mayoral contest.
But the scale of Sir Keir’s electoral problems are dwarfed by those facing Mr Sunak. No wonder the Labour leader called on the PM to ‘make way’ and call a general election.
One Cabinet minister acknowledged that voters are ‘not listening to us’, but insisted the Tories could still make a dramatic late comeback when the public is presented with competing visions for the future at the election.
‘Obviously the situation is terrible, but we are very good at winning when we are not meant to and Labour are very good at losing when they should win,’ the source said optimistically.
But optimism will not be enough for the PM. Strip away the comfort blanket of the Tees Valley and the results are grim – and Mr Sunak now just has six months to turn things round. His MPs might have decided not to throw him out. But there is every sign the voters will make a different decision in the autumn.