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I am not expecting the Conservatives to be ‘wiped out’ in the local elections. Incremental losses from a good set of results for them in 2015 but not doomsday.
1. Nobody else is positively popular. The last wipeout in this set of seats was 1995 at the crest of the Blair wave.
2. National polling shows Con losing support to options that won’t be available in the local elections. Most English council elections will be between Con, Lab, Lib Dem and possibly some Independents and Greens. Trad Con voters will probably revert to Con (but not in EP vote)
3. Further, half of winning is showing up - and the Tories did this better than anyone in the nominations. They have more candidates and 200+ have already been returned unopposed.
4. Many of the seats being contested are in rural and small town areas where Lab support and organisation haven’t increased much. To sustain massive losses here - as in 1993 and 1995 - the Lib Dems need to be doing serious business, and in 2019 they aren’t.
5. These elections cover many midlands areas where there has been a long term Lab to Con swing - North Warwickshire, NW Leics, S Derbyshire, Staffs Moorlands etc. Simply, who is going to knock out the Tories in these areas?
6. Tories have hardly anything to lose in the large city authorities coming up - if they lose everything in Leicester, Nottingham, Brighton, Luton etc that doesn’t amount to many net seats.
7. The number of seats available is shrinking with local government reforms and changes to the electoral calendar. In short, Con result in 2019 is going to look (and be) less diabolical than past wipeout years and people shouldn’t be surprised.
8. But these calculations are without a great sense of what the experience has been on the doorstep. If you think I’m wrong, please do tell me why (as a reply or a confidential DM). And now I’ll stop before I go full Abramson. /ends
