Tories brace for losses in UK local elections

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Early results of local council elections in England and Northern Ireland have shown that the Conservatives are feared to lose as they brace for a backlash over the Brexit deadlock, AP and BBC reported.

Voting took place on Thursday in 259 local authorities across England – although not in London – and Northern Ireland. No local elections are taking place in Scotland and Wales.

The Conservatives, who currently hold almost 60% of the seats up for grabs, are forecast to lose hundreds of them as both pro-Brexit and pro-European Union voters express frustration at the political impasse around Britain's departure from the bloc, AP says.

Britain's Prime Minister Theresa May leaves after casting her vote at a polling station near her home in Thames Valley, England, May 2, 2019. /AP Photo

First results are due overnight, although many areas won't begin counting until Friday morning.

The final results are scheduled to come throughout Friday, mostly between midday at 18:00 local time.

The BBC says both Conservatives and Labour will be punished due to the Brexit deadlock, while the Liberal Democrats, Green Party and UKIP are expected to benefit from their losses.

British voters are going to the polls again on May 23 in a European Parliament election, unless lawmakers pass Prime Minister Theresa May's thrice-rejected EU divorce deal before then so Britain can leave the bloc.

Brexit deadlock

May has been unable to persuade parliament to approve her plan for leaving the EU, forcing her to ask Brussels to extend Britain's membership until October. She has turned to Labour in search of a compromise that could get enough support, but how, when, and even if, Britain will leave the EU remains unclear.

The first results are due to be released in the hours after polling closes at 2100 GMT on Thursday.

Robert Hayward, a polling specialist and former Conservative lawmaker, said he expected the Conservatives to lose more than 800 seats, Labour to gain fewer than 300 and the Liberal Democrats to pick up more than 500.

British Prime Minister Theresa May holds a news conference following an extraordinary European Union leaders summit to discuss Brexit, in Brussels, Belgium, April 11, 2019. /Reuters Photo

Another analysis by academics Colin Rallings and Michael Thrasher suggested that a swing in polling toward Labour could translate into Conservative losses of more than 1,000 seats and 800 Labour gains.

Local elections are historically seen as an imperfect proxy for national sentiment because turnout is low, they do not cover every area of the country, and can be narrowly focused on local issues such as street lighting and refuse collection.

Council elections take place in yearly batches across England. There are also some local elections taking place in Northern Ireland on Thursday but none in Wales and Scotland, which operate under a different schedule.

The English seats being contested on Thursday were last up for grabs when the Conservatives were riding high in 2015, on the same day as May's predecessor David Cameron won the party's first majority in parliament for 23 years.

"A fall from that level is therefore inevitable at some stage, and it will come this year – with force," Hayward said.

(With input from Reuters)