Early England election results make it clear: we are in an era of five-party politics

"English local election results require careful interpretation. Not all places have them at the same time, a relatively small proportion complete their counts overnight and the early headlines may not reflect outcomes later in the day. But the headline number on Friday morning that Labour has lost more than 250 councillors - will only grow as the day progresses. While Labour will want to stress that these mid-term elections often go badly for the incumbent Westminster government, they rarely go quite as badly as this."

"The main beneficiary has been Reform UK, which began from a standing start, having not contested the previous elections for these councils, and now has almost 400 councillors with undoubtedly many more to come. The size of losses and gains will change, but these early headlines are unlikely to. However, with results still to come from large parts of England, including many London councils, and with votes for the Scottish parliament and Welsh Senedd still to be counted, further nuance will be added to this picture, if not in terms of the Labour losses, then in terms of who has benefited."

"Some caution is required in extrapolating from the headlines to voter behaviour. We cannot assume that because Labour has the most losses and Reform the most gains that voters switched directly from Labour to Reform. Even if Labour has lost a seat directly to Reform this may not be because of direct switching. A split vote on the left, for example, Labour losing votes to the Green party, can make the winning threshold lower. And we have already seen many close contests and low winning shares."

"Labour held Waltham Cross in Broxbourne with 28.7% of the vote, while Reform came second on 28.1%. It is not possible from the profile of results to infer how voters moved between parties, or how any particular group of voters cast their votes. What is striking about these results is not just the poor performance of the government, or the sustained success of Reform UK, but rather"

Local election results in England require careful interpretation because counts finish at different times and early headlines may change. Friday morning figures showing Labour losing more than 250 councillors are expected to increase as more results are reported. Mid-term local elections often harm the incumbent Westminster government, but the scale here is unusually large. Reform UK is the main beneficiary, rising from a standing start to nearly 400 councillors, with more likely to follow. However, further results from parts of England, including many London councils, plus Scottish and Welsh votes, will add nuance. Headlines do not reveal voter switching, since losses can be caused by split left votes, lower winning thresholds, and close contests, such as Waltham Cross in Broxbourne where Labour won with 28.7% and Reform placed second with 28.1%.

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