Promises are one thing, but delivery, particularly in local government, is another

Local election results in the UK carry heavy caveats for pollsters, but last week’s ballot told only one unmistakable story: the unstoppable Reform tsunami.

The culturally conservative, economically interventionist party, led by the charismatic Nigel Farage, pulled off a series of gains no other party of its ilk ever did, winning nearly 700 councilors, control of ten councils, two regional mayoralties, and coming within a whisker of snatching two more mayoralties in Labour strongholds. To top their stunning successes, they won a parliamentary by-election in one of Labour’s 50 safest seats.

The two main parties, who’ve polled at historic lows since last year’s general election, have hemorrhaged support. The Conservatives, still bruised from their drubbing in July, and who had last fought these councils on a post-vaccine rollout high in 2021, shed nearly 700 councilors, and lost control of every council they were defending. Labour, who were starting from a low base, having performed badly in 2021, still managed to lose close to 200 councilors.

Reform, having eaten the Tories’ lunch at July’s general election, are now storming through Labour’s territory, scooping up disaffected working-class voters. A sputtering economy, record illegal immigration, and unpopular measures implemented by the Labour government have driven a change-hungry electorate right into Farage’s arms.

Lame Leadership

Responding to the results, Prime Minister Keir Starmer promised to “go further and faster to deliver the change people voted for,” but Labour campaigners and candidates told a story of real anger at the government’s current direction, and urged Starmer to change tack, rather than keep going. Pollster Luke Tryl told Times Radio the policies that voters noticed the most were welfare cuts and business tax hikes, backed up anecdotally by local campaigners.

Meanwhile, Reform’s opposition to the government’s green policies poses a dilemma for Starmer, who made the industrial opportunities of net zero a key plank of his administration, and Labour’s newfound hawkishness on immigration is forcing them to eat their words from just a couple of years ago, as well as unnerving those on the left.

It’s an open secret in Westminster that Starmer lacks a guiding political philosophy and has subcontracted political strategy to his chief of staff, Morgan McSweeney, the architect of Labour’s shift to the right on issues like immigration and a clampdown on out-of-control welfare bills.

But strategists warn that a rightward tilt could cost the main parties votes elsewhere, pointing to significant gains by the center-left Liberal Democrats from the Conservatives, and hard-left Greens from Labour. Faced with fragmenting voter coalitions who’ve shown willingness to go elsewhere, the old two-party system looks well and truly broken.

On the Conservative side, their penchant for changing underperforming leaders means six months in, embattled opposition leader Kemi Badenoch is facing accusations she hasn’t done enough for the Tories’ post-election recovery. She has yet to set out the party’s direction or much in the way of alternative policies, insisting it takes time to formulate policy.

But demoralized Conservatives, many having just seen their local campaigning infrastructure decimated by these council losses, fret that with Reform taking over on the right, there is no time for philosophizing over fundamentals or granular policy commissions.

Testing, Testing

While these results are a huge boost for Reform and its credibility, it also means, for the first time, it will have executive power, responsibility, and accountability. Promises are one thing, but delivery, particularly in local government, is another.

In a scathing piece for Conservative Home, Henry Hill notes that local government is no longer where garbage is collected and roads are maintained. Instead, it’s become a dumping ground for expensive parts of the welfare state the government wishes to keep off its own books, such as social care and special educational needs, where councils are mandated to provide services, but are not granted proportional funding for them. Reform, who have promised DOGE-style inquiries into local government waste, will likely find that, a few examples of profligacy aside, most councils are drowning in debts over which they have no control.

Still, Reform’s success comes from anger over national issues. The Conservatives’ record on immigration is a humiliation for the now-opposition party, and Labour has fared little better on stopping illegal Channel crossings.

Reform’s war against Labour’s environmental policies was boosted just days before the elections when former Labour PM Tony Blair published a report warning against an irrational, expensive, and ineffective rush to net zero, implying criticism of the government’s current green policies.

The state-funded National Health Service, while showing incremental signs of improvement, remains in perma-crisis mode, with millions unable to access basic services. An insane planning system has made building everything from houses to infrastructure onerous and expensive. Although Labour has taken steps to improve this, their efforts will take years to bear fruit.

Meanwhile, the overwhelming sense that Britain is broken shows no signs of dissipating. Having voted for change in 2016 with Brexit, 2017 with near victory for socialist Jeremy Corbyn, 2019 for Boris Johnson, and 2024 for Labour, a despairing electorate has pressed the “Change” button again. Will these results ultimately deliver Nigel Farage to Downing Street, or will Reform join the list of failed attempts to reboot Britain?

(Originally featured in Mishpacha, Issue 1060)