Super Thursday 2021 part 6: Overall reflections

 Like the 2019 general election, this set of local elections affirms a political realignment in British politics, where the ex-industrial and ex-mining north and Midlands are becoming more safely Conservative, with the south east conversely moving towards the Greens, Labour and the Liberal Democrats. The statistics speak for themselves:

• Net Conservative gains in the north (North East, North West, and Yorkshire & The Humber): 107
• Net Conservative gains in the Midlands (East and West Midlands): 114.
• Net Conservative gains in the south (East of England, South East, and South West): 14 (although most county councils in the south actually saw net losses for the Conservatives, most notably East Sussex, Hertfordshire, Surrey and West Sussex, as well as 10 notional losses in Buckinghamshire).

The majority of these were from Labour but they made notable gains from the Liberal Democrats in some councils; the Lib Dems lost all representation in Walsall and their 4 net losses in Maidstone & The Weald proved decisive to the Conservatives' gain of that council from no overall control. 

The pattern of Green gains across England also bears noting:

• Net Green gains in the north: 24.
• Net Green gains in the Midlands:10.
• Net Green gains in the south: 54.

And these gains were spread relatively evenly between from the Conservatives and from Labour, depending on whether they happened in urban areas or rural areas.

(NB: By-elections that took place in councils with no election this year have not been factored into the totals above).

Although Sir Keir Starmer's lacklustre leadership has been blamed for Labour losses, with a vaccine bounce responsible for surprise Conservative gains, the reality is that even a repeat of the 2019 scenario would still have seen some net Conservative gains in the north and Midlands, due to demographic change. The fading away of traditional industries has seen an exodus of younger people to major cities where employment opportunities are better, combined with people increasingly wanting to retire outside the city if they cannot do so abroad, excessive house prices pushing those on middle incomes out of most of the south with more sensible house prices in the Midlands attracting substantial increases in home ownership, and greater ethnic diversity stretching into the suburbs, has produced political changes that no party leader will be able to reverse even in normally favourable circumstances. It will be a long time before the Conservatives regain control of Oxfordshire, and they will probably never again control Trafford. Labour will likewise not be regaining control of Cannock Chase or North East Lincolnshire anytime soon.

The south east's shift towards Labour, the Liberal Democrats and the Greens, combined with a similar shift in much of the south west, is reminiscent of the north east of the United States of America, as well as the southern state of Virginia which borders on the US capital of Washington DC, moving firmly into the Democratic camp having once been a Republican bedrock in the days when the "Boston Brahmins" were key influencers in the Republican Party, and the coalmining state of West Virginia now one of the most safely Republican areas having been a Democrat stronghold in the 1960s. In this context the Conservatives were lucky not to lose control of East Sussex and Gloucestershire county councils, and Labour losing control of Sandwell and Sunderland is not that far away.

The Liberal Democrats meanwhile, are being pushed further back into their affluent enclaves into the south, including Cheltenham, Three Rivers, and Winchester, and Labour are being pushed further back into the cities, university towns, better educated metropolitan boroughs, and the south coast thanks to Brightonians who can no longer afford to live in Brighton & Hove moving across to Worthing, Shoreham-by-Sea, Peacehaven etc. In the shire counties outside those areas, only the Green Party, and a few Independents, made any headway against the Conservatives, although their announced plans to overhaul development and planning laws, which could see local councils unable to block planning applications in designated growth zones, have undoubtedly been responsible for many Conservative losses in the south.

It must be mentioned that above all else, shifting cultural values have been responsible for this realignment, hence why so many Conservative gains were made in council areas with ageing populations with high levels of home ownership, especially where right to buy had its most significant effects in the 1990s and 2000s, with the few Labour and Liberal Democrat gains being where the young and well-educated are increasingly dominant. The road to Downing Street will no longer run through Corby in future, but rather through Milton Keynes, Calderdale and Kirklees where the majority of wards continue to remain marginal.