Every year, I compile a set of local election results that are fully comparable over a long set of elections - no boundary changes and an election every year of the by-thirds cycle: the same wards in 2016, 2018, 2019, 2021, 2022, 2023, 2024. There are 698 of them. So, in a completely like with like comparison of wards, how does party performance look and where does 2024 fit in? Here are the results in seats:

Hello from the departure area of Singapore airport, with a few thoughts on why anyone talking about ‘Singapore on Thames’ doesn’t know what they’re talking about… 1. Yes, Singapore is a free-market open economy. But it has an extremely active state. There is little hesitation in managing people’s lives in considerable detail. People comply. British-style libertarians (ie entitled rich loudmouths) would hate it.

This is a bit of a personal reflection, do I might end up deleting it. But in the meantime… the thing is, I get on quite well with centre-right people. I won’t embarrass them by naming names, but I really value the friendship and mutual professional respect I’ve encountered… … even on this site. I respect their scepticism, humanity and pragmatism and take the analysis seriously. Like my sort of hero Reggie Maudling, I have a vague belief in progress through dialectic and that requires a common understanding of the problems if not a common solution.

I mentioned a few days ago that I've been working on ways of comparing party performance year to year in local elections. One of the ways is to just look at the wards, like those in most Metro boroughs, that are fought in three years out of four since 2015 on constant boundaries These are a much more urban, working class and northern selection of wards than England as a whole; no London, not much south west; they also omit the core cities (so include e.g. Wigan rather than Manchester). They vote more Lab, but are Brexity/ realigning.

Just been typing in the local election results from several Midland towns where Labour were utterly destroyed last year - Tamworth, Redditch, Cannock Chase. This year's results actually show a small swing to Lab since 2018... ... now, the results in 2018 were not fantastic for Labour in these places - a bit of realignment had already happened by then - but it is striking how little of the ground the Tories gained in 2021 proved sustainable...

🧵If you follow local election results for years, you probably end up with some 'favourite' wards, if you're anything like me - wards that are usually indicators of where the national tide is, or perennial marginals, or wards that hang on improbably for one or other party... One of my favourite wards is Denby Dale in Kirklees, part of the Dewsbury constituency. Kirklees wards are large - 13,000 or so electors. Denby Dale is rural, and includes other villages like Skelmanthorpe and Emley, famous for its sinister-looking transmitter tower...

I’ve been away nearly two weeks now on the borders of Poland and Czechia doing @BastonBorders research. It was perhaps just about late summer when I started, but it’s now golden and autumnal. It’s a bit lonely, despite meeting interesting and kind people on the way. I miss my partner and my cats, and more. But I don’t belong in England either - I feel profoundly alienated from the place I used to love. I’m trapped, by practicality as well as bonds of affection.

How does the Con/ Lab lead in local elections match up with national opinion polls? Pretty well. Chart shows National Equivalent Vote lead in local elections since 1980 plotted with the polling average for the month before (usually April). Differential turnout in local elections seems to drive some exceptions. Labour governments consistently do worse in local elections given their national polls (goes back to 1965, 1976 as well as Blair era).

Empty plinth, Cavendish Square Londo A statue of the Duke of Cumberland, the Butcher of Culloden, stood here 1770-1868. It was taken down by its owners for ‘recasting’ in 1868 but was never put back up. blogs.ucl.ac.uk/survey-of-lond…

This parliament is not and should not be ‘dead’. It has a more recent and stronger mandate from the electors than the referendum (18m votes in 2017) and represents the balance of opinion in a divided nation. Long may it like be while this appointed, mandate-free government fails. It also, by having significant voices for Leaving with a reasonable deal (the independent ex Tories and, loath though I am to say so, the Kinnock/ Nandy sort of Labour MP) represents the ‘missing middle’ fairly proportionately.

In another (probably doomed) attempt to introduce actual statistics to a 'debate': Labour target seats are NOT, repeat NOT, strongly Leave. of the 50 seats where Labour came closest in 2017, the average Leave vote in 2016 was... 50.1 per cent. This makes them more Remain than avg 2/4 21 of those seats voted Remain. 9 more were close to the national average (50-55% Leave). 11 more were clearly Leave (55-60%) and only 9 were hard-core Leave (more than 60 per cent). Given national polling, the middle group might well be Remain now

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.