Starmer’s collapse continues despite Scottish blip – and makes Labour’s 14% last month look like unattainable heights
To little attention from the UK ‘mainstream’ media, Keir Starmer’s Labour came last in three West Sussex County Council by-elections last week, all in ordinary – ie not particularly affluent – areas, losing all of them to the LibDems. Worse, for Starmer, the party did not even manage double figures in any of them – or even close to double figures – and finished significantly behind the Greens:
St Leonard’s Forest:
Sam Raby (Lib Dem) – 644 votes (32%)
Robert Nye (Reform UK) – 584 (29%)
Damian Stuart (Con) – 401 (20%)
Andrew Finnegan (Green) – 259 (13%)
Sara Loewenthal (Labour) – 94 (5%)
Burgess Hill North:
Jane Davey (Lib Dem) – 1,088 (41%)
Tim Cooper (Reform UK) – 707 (27%)
Mustak Miah (Con) – 618 (23%)
Paul Woods (Green) – 153 (6%)
Jake Tennant (Lab) – 92 (3%)
Hassocks and Burgess Hill South:
Erika Woodhurst-Trueman (Lib Dem) – 1,694 (55%)
Peter Bradshaw (Reform UK) – 762 (25%)
Eliza-Jane Brazil (Con) – 310 (10%)
Sue Kelly (Green) – 175 (6%)
Martin McCabe (Labour) – 123 (4%)
Starmer has tried to make much of Labour scraping a win in last week’s Scottish parliamentary by-election in Hamilton, Larkhall and Stonehouse, but one win in a seat where the SNP had no ground game can’t disguise the continuation – and deepening – of Starmer’s collapse.
Labour managed only 14% across the English local elections last month; that was a record defeat for a new PM – but 14% looks like the unattainable heights of Shangri-La for Starmer now. By incompetence or by design, he has destroyed Labour and continues to open the door for neo-fascist, corporate ‘Reform UK’.
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Beens saying it for years. Labour is moribund.
Those who remain are nowt but tory worms, devouring the corpse,
I include the likes of Abbott and mcdonnell in that; they’ve had ample opportunity to jump ship, but would – certainly in the case mcdonnell, gardiner and a few other of the ‘old guard’ – rather cling on in the hope that their (once) red rosettes will buy them another term in their sinecures.
Agree. It would to good hear from Ian Byrne MP as to the thinking behind being obediently Labour and John McDonnell MP as to the value of being independent and invisible.