Skip to content
Search

Latest Stories

Local elections: Johnson suffers heavy losses in London

Local elections: Johnson suffers heavy losses in London

BRITISH prime minister Boris Johnson's Conservative Party lost control of traditional strongholds in London and suffered losses elsewhere in local elections, early results on Friday (6) showed, as voters punished his government over a raft of scandals.

Johnson's party was ousted in Wandsworth, a low-tax Conservative stronghold since 1978, part of a trend in the British capital where voters used the elections to express anger over a cost-of-living crisis and fines imposed on the prime minister for breaking his own Covid-19 lockdown rules.


The Conservatives lost control of the borough of Barnet, which has been held by the party in all but two elections since 1964. Labour also believes it has won for the first time the council of Westminster, a district where most government institutions are located.

"This is a warning shot from Conservative voters," said Daniel Thomas, the Conservative leader of Barnet council.

The overall tally due later on Friday will offer the most important snapshot of public opinion since Johnson won the Conservative Party's biggest majority in more than 30 years in the 2019 general election.

The ballot is the first electoral test for Johnson since he became the first British leader in living memory to have broken the law while in office. He was fined last month for attending a birthday gathering in his office in 2020, breaking social distancing rules then in place to curb Covid's spread.

Early results showed the Conservative Party had lost 92 council seats. The main opposition Labour Party had gained 23 seat and the Liberal Democrats 42 seats.

British prime minister Boris Johnson British prime minister Boris Johnson (Photo by Matt Dunham - WPA Pool/Getty Images)

The loss of key councils in London, where the Conservatives were almost wiped out, will increase pressure on Johnson, who has been fighting for his political survival for months and faces the possibility of more police fines over his attendance at other lockdown-breaking gatherings.

The elections held on Thursday (5) will decide almost 7,000 council seats, including all those in London, Scotland and Wales, and a third of the seats in most of the rest of England.

Johnson upended conventional British politics in the 2019 general election by winning and then promising to improve living standards in former industrial areas in central and northern England.

But the loss of Wandsworth, Barnet and potentially Westminster symbolises the way that Johnson, who won two terms as mayor of London, has lost his appeal in the capital. His support for Brexit has cost him support in London, where a majority of voters supported staying in the European Union in the 2016 Brexit referendum.

Local leaders want Johnson to go

The outcome outside the capital is likely to be less clear-cut. The Conservatives lost overall control of councils in Southampton, Worcester and West Oxfordshire.

But the party has not done as badly as some polls had predicted. One poll in the run-up to the elections said the Conservatives could lose about 800 council seats.

John Curtice, a professor of politics at the University of Strathclyde, said early trends suggested the Conservatives were on course to lose about 250 seats. He said the results suggested Labour may not emerge as the largest party at the next election.

However, some local Conservative council leaders called on Johnson to resign after the party's poor performance, which they blamed on him being fined and the cost-of-living crisis.

John Mallinson, Conservative leader of Carlisle city council, told the BBC that had found it "difficult to drag the debate back to local issues".

"I just don't feel people any longer have the confidence that the prime minister can be relied upon to tell the truth," he said.

Simon Bosher, the most senior Conservative in Portsmouth, said the party's leadership in Westminster needed to "take a good, long hard look in the mirror" to find out why they had lost seats.

(Reuters)

More For You

Modi meets Vance, family in Paris

Narendra Modi in a group picture with US vice president JD Vance and his wife Usha Vance and their children Ewan and Vivek, at Elysee Palace in Paris. (ANI Photo)

Modi meets Vance, family in Paris

US vice president JD Vance and Indian prime minister Narendra Modi spoke on Tuesday (11) about how the US can assist India in diversifying its energy sourcing through investments in US nuclear technology, the White House said.

The meeting between Vance and Modi in Paris, where they were both attending an artificial intelligence summit, came ahead of the prime minister's US visit later this week in which topics like trade, investment, technology and immigration are expected to be discussed.

Keep ReadingShow less
Heathrow to submit third runway proposal by summer

A British Airways passenger plane takes off behind houses next to land earmarked for a third runway at Longford near Heathrow Airport. REUTERS/Toby Melville

Heathrow to submit third runway proposal by summer

LONDON's Heathrow Airport, one of the world's busiest hubs, will submit its proposal for a third runway to the British government by summer, its chief executive Thomas Woldbye will say in a speech on Wednesday (12).

The move comes after chancellor Rachel Reeves said last month the government would back the construction of a new runway at Heathrow to boost trade and economic growth.

Keep ReadingShow less
trump-musk-

Musk, standing alongside Trump in the Oval Office with his 4-year-old son, said he was leading the effort to cut government waste. (Photo: Getty Images)

Trump, Musk move to cut federal workforce under new order

US PRESIDENT Donald Trump has directed federal agencies to work with Elon Musk to identify government jobs that can be cut and functions that can be eliminated.

The move is part of an effort to reduce the federal workforce and align it with Trump’s policy priorities.

Keep ReadingShow less
Ed-Miliband-India

Miliband said his meetings with Indian officials reinforced the commitment to work together in key areas, including grid modernisation, offshore wind, and industrial decarbonisation.

Exclusive: UK-India energy partnership strengthens as Miliband backs clean transition

BRITAIN sees India as a “crucial partner” as both countries aim to deepen their cooperation on clean energy, with a focus on renewables and climate action, UK secretary of state for energy security and net zero, Ed Miliband, said.

On a visit to India this week, Miliband highlighted India’s ambitious renewable energy targets and its commitment to achieving net zero by 2070.

Keep ReadingShow less
Bangladesh's former government accused of 'crimes against humanity'

Sheikh Hasina (Photo credit: Getty Images)

Bangladesh's former government accused of 'crimes against humanity'

BANGLADESH's former government was behind systematic attacks and killings of protesters as it strived to hold onto power last year, the UN said Wednesday (12), warning the abuses could amount to "crimes against humanity".

Before premier Sheikh Hasina was toppled in a student-led revolution last August, her government oversaw a systematic crackdown on protesters and others, including "hundreds of extrajudicial killings", the UN said.

Keep ReadingShow less