Thread by @AnushkaAsthana

Explained today on #peston what to think about when interpreting Friday’s results-and trying to map them towards gen election. One is the comparison point. Labour tanked in 2019 general election but vote share in 2018 (comparison for most seats up) was neck and neck w Tories 1/

Which is why so many psephologists stress that in some places Labour standing would still be progress. I ran through some councils that will help us draw conclusions. Eg Bury council- if Labour retains its majority on council that would indicate 2 MP seats could be won by them 2/

Christian Wakeford has since crossed floor, but Tories won both Bury seats in 2019. Labour has to win back to have any chance. As @itvnews election analyst Colin Rallings said-Bury is the foothills in electoral mountain Starmer needs to overcome to have any chance of being pm 3/

On flipside if Tories shift dial in these red wall seats that will be sign they are digging in - or could make red wall gains. Eg Sunderland council. Labour has held MP seats there but could it’s council majority be reduced? (Losing control would be v bad sign for Lab) 4/

One q no party knows answer to is how many Tories could stay at home tomorrow, or how much people local over national. These things make national predictions hard. We will also want to look at blue wall 5/

For eg- we’ve seen big change in Worthing council - from no Labour councillors pre 2018 to neck and neck now. There is demographic change here that favours Labour. So if it’s making progress - really you’d expect Labour to take council 6/

And even if there is a win- next q is how many areas are changing like Worthing and where are they? There will be lots of interesting dynamics in Lib Dem v Tory areas. And London will be interesting too. In Scotland vote share key. In NI assembly could be a significant shift 7/

Here is the clip from Peston. And we will be back with analysis after polls close and through Friday.

https://twitter.com/itvpeston/status/1521977217097601026