Nigel Farage hailed ‘Reform-quake’ in local elections today as he saw his fledgling party rout the Tories and Labour in their back yards.
The jubilant party now runs a swath of big authorities for the first time – securing majorities on Kent, Staffordshire, Lincolnshire, Derbyshire, Nottinghamshire and Lancashire county councils after a Conservative collapse.
Labour’s worst fears were also realised as Durham – regarded as the spiritual home of the labour movement – fell after a century under the party’s control.
As a landmark set of results takes shape, Mr Farage celebrated with activists in the North East.
In an ominous warning, he recalled that people had mocked him for saying he would be the next PM, adding: ‘They’re not laughing now, are they?’
A projected national vote share from the local election results put Reform on 30 per cent, ahead of Labour on 20 per cent, the Lib Dems on 17 per cent, and Tories on 15 per cent.
This would give Reform a 102-seat majority in the House of Commons if replicated at a general election, according to one estimation.
Mr Farage said his party would end WFH in councils and introduce US-style ‘DOGE’ departments, saying staff working on diversity or climate change projects should be ‘seeking alternative careers’.
The Clacton MP also vowed to ‘resist’ having migrants housed in Reform council areas.
The Conservatives are anticipating losing 600-700 seats in total, even bleaker than the 500 that had been predicted. The areas up for grabs are traditionally true-blue and were last decided at Boris Johnson’s peak in 2021.
The party has been shedding votes in all directions, losing its grip on Devon County Council amid gains by the Lib Dems.
Tory leader Kemi Badenoch said the public were ‘fed up’ with Labour, but admitted they are not yet ready to trust her party.
Earlier, Reform gave Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer a bloody nose by taking Runcorn and Helsby in a dramatic knife-edge parliamentary by-election that gave a first signal national polls were translating into real votes and real power.
Reform’s Dame Andrea Jenkyns has romped home as the first Greater Lincolnshire mayor with an enormous 40,000 majority over the Tories.
Luke Campbell, the former boxer and Olympic medallist, appeared on track to win the Hull and East Yorkshire mayoralty for Reform.
The party only narrowly missed out on having a mayor in North Tyneside, cutting a Labour majority of almost 14,000 down to just 444.
It was a similar story in Doncaster, where Labour’s Ros Jones closed out Mr Farage’s party by just 698 votes. The Tories were in third, with the right-wing parties together taking 57 per cent of the vote.
Ms Jones launched an extraordinary tirade at Sir Keir after the announcement, berating him for not ‘listening’ to unrest over cuts to winter fuel allowance and the national insurance hike.
Despite ministers pleading for calm, MPs quickly joined the demands for a change in direction from the premier, saying his leadership has not been ‘good enough’.
Speaking on a visit to Bedfordshire, Sir Keir said he wanted to go ‘further and faster’ admitting the result were ‘disappointing’. But the PM insisted that controversial Budget decisions had been ‘tough but right’.
On a momentous day for British politics:
Acknowledging even he was surprised by the scale of Reform’s gains, Mr Farage boasted: ‘This is Reform-quake. That’s what’s going on across the country today.’
Dismissing the idea of a merger with the Tories, Mr Farage said: ‘We’re going to win the next election on our own’.
He said council staff working on diversity or climate change initiatives should be ‘seeking alternative careers’ after the party took control of Durham.
‘I would advise anybody who’s working for Durham County Council on climate change initiatives or Diversity, Equity and Inclusion or … things that you go on working from home, I think you all better really be seeking alternative careers very, very quickly,’ he told activists in the city.
‘We want to give council taxpayers better value for money. We want to reduce excessive expenditure. We want to find out who the long-term contracts are signed with and why, and reduce the scale of local government back to what it ought to be.’
Mr Farage said Reform will ‘resist’ having migrants placed ‘in these counties that we now control’.
‘The number of people I’ve met in the north, just so enraged because they get up early in the morning, they go to work, they pay their taxes, and they see young men crossing the English Channel, being dumped into the north of England getting everything for free.’
He later added: ‘It is unfair, it is irresponsible, it is wrong in every way and I don’t believe Starmer has got the guts to deal with it but (…) we at national level have got the guts to deal with it and we will resist central government plonking scores, hundreds of these young men in these counties that we now control.’
Sir Keir is expected to respond by unveiling a new crackdown on immigration soon, and has faced pressure from some quarters to overhaul the government’s stance on Net Zero.
Reform were also a shock second in the West of England, where Labour held the mayoralty in what was meant to be a two-horse race between them and the Greens.
In the coming hours Mr Farage’s outfit is favourite to win the Hull & East Yorks mayoralty and is expected to take hundreds of council seats surrendered by the Tories.
Reform took Nottinghamshire after winning the 34 seats needed for a majority on the county council.
Conservatives were previously the biggest party on the council with 33 seats, with 17 independents and Labour 13.
Mr Farage’s party also took charge of Derbyshire, after winning more than the 33 seats needed for a majority.
Conservatives previously had 40 seats in Derbyshire, with Labour on 15.
Reform will run Lancashire after winning the 43 seats needed for a majority on the county council.
The Conservatives previously controlled the council with 46 seats ahead of Labour on 27, while Reform had just two.
Tories lost Leicestershire to no overall control after shipping 25 seats, with Reform gaining 24.
Reform is now the biggest party with 25 seats, the Conservatives on 15, Liberal Democrats 11, Labour two, Green one and one independent.
Warwickshire went from a Tory council to no overall control following a Reform UK surge.
At a defence contractor in Bedfordshire – where there are no elections happening – Sir Keir pointed to rising wages and easing interest rates.
‘What I want to say is, my response is we get it,’ he said. ‘We were elected in last year to bring about change.’
He said that his party have ‘started that work’ with changes such as reductions in NHS waiting lists, and he added: ‘I am determined that we will go further and faster on the change that people want to see.’
Asked about controversial policies such as the winter fuel allowance, Sir Keir told Sky News: ‘The reason that we took the tough but right decisions in the budget was because we inherited a broken economy.
‘Maybe other prime ministers would have walked past that, pretended it wasn’t there (…) I took the choice to make sure our economy was stable.’
He added: ‘Yes they were tough decisions, they were the right decisions. Because of those decisions we are now seeing waiting lists coming down, something people desperately want.
‘Because of that pensioners are now £470 up as of last month, these are really important changes.’
Mike Amesbury won Runcorn with a huge majority of 14,696 in July, but he resigned earlier this year after being convicted of assaulting a constituent on a night out, triggering this vote.
Ms Pochin received 12,645 votes with her Labour rival just behind on 12,639. The Conservatives received 2,341.
The previous post-war record for the smallest majority at a by-election was 57 in Berwick-Upon-Tweed in 1973.
Watched by Mr Farage, victorious candidate Sarah Pochin said the public was sending a message that ‘enough is enough’. ‘Enough Tory failure, enough Labour lies,’ she said.
Mrs Badenoch told Conservative councillors who have lost their seats she is ‘sincerely sorry’ and that while the public are ‘fed up’ with Labour, they are not yet ready to trust the Tories.
‘What I saw everywhere I campaigned was that people are fed up with the Labour government,’ she said.
‘They were angry about winter fuel payments. They were angry about the jobs tax, but they are still not yet ready to trust us.
‘We have a big job to do to rebuild trust with the public.
‘That’s the job from Conservative Party has given me and I am going to make sure that we get ourselves back to the place where we are seen as the credible alternative to Labour.’
In a message to Conservative councillors, she described ‘how sincerely sorry I am for your loss’ but pledged that ‘we are going to win those seats back’.
In one of the first major shocks of the night, Labour’s Karen Clark won the race to be mayor of North Tyneside – held by the party since the post’s inception in 2002.
But the margin of victory was just 444 votes, ahead of Reform’s John Falkenstein in second place and the Tories pushed down to third.
The last time the mayoralty was up for grabs in 2021 the Labour majority was almost 14,000 – although a different voting system was used then.
Mr Farage’s long-term ally Arron Banks put in a strong showing in the West of England mayoralty, overhauling the Greens to come second.
In Greater Lincolnshire, Dame Andrea received 104,133 votes, with the Tories far behind on 64,585. Turnout was just under 30 per cent.
She said that ‘inch-by-inch Reform will reset Britain to its glorious past’, paying tribute to Mr Farage.
‘I know one day he will make a great prime minister,’ she added.
In Staffordshire, Reform have secured 38 council seats with more still to count. They needed 32 for an outright majority.
Until yesterday the Conservatives held 53 of the 62 seats.
Mr Farage said this morning that he was ‘delighted’ with the outcomes so far. ‘It’s been a huge night for Reform. One or two near misses in the mayoral contests but a huge night for Reform,’ he told reporters at the count in Runcorn.
He said it had been an ’emotional rollercoaster’ for Ms Pochin.
‘It’s the closest by-election since the war and I think one of the most dramatic, but I sense, also, one of the most significant,’ he said.
Mr Farage branded Sir Keir a ‘coward’ for failing to visit Runcorn during the campaign.
‘He obviously feared they might lose, therefore he didn’t come,’ he said.
‘I knocked on doors for eight hours today and I would have been here in this hall with our candidate regardless, whether we had won or lost by six votes.’
Jibing at Kemi Badenoch, Mr Farage said: ‘We want you to stay on as leader. I’ll put some money if you’d like to keep you there.
‘She’s got an impossible job. The Conservative Party is split.’
Of Reform’s approach to local government, Mr Farage suggested they will crack down on staff working from home and emulate Elon Musk’s cost-cutting drive. He said ‘every county council needs a DOGE’.
Northumberland was the first county council to declare all its results, with Conservatives winning 26 seats, Reform 23, Labour eight, Independents seven, Liberal Democrats three and Greens two.
With the Conservatives and Reform now holding 49 of the 69 seats on the council, it raises the question of whether the parties will have to deal to run it.
The council was previously led by a minority Conservative administration, with the party down seven and Labour down nine, while Reform previously had no seats on the council.
Paul Bristow won the Cambridge & Peterborough mayoral contest with a majority of more than 10,500 over Reform.
The Tories held the post before losing it to Labour four years ago.
A party spokesman said: ‘On a very difficult night, this is a significant win for the Conservative Party.
‘Paul Bristow will be a fantastic local champion, working hard to deliver the lower taxes and better services the residents of Cambridgeshire and Peterborough deserve.
‘Labour previously held this mayoralty and won two new MPs in the region last year, so for Paul to win today shows how Kemi Badenoch’s Conservatives are already making inroads into the Labour vote.
‘Coming on the back of losing the previously safe Labour seat of Runcorn, as well as council seats in regions with large numbers of Labour MPs, this result is likely to increase concerns in Labour over Keir Starmer’s faltering leadership.’
Returning Doncaster mayor Ms Jones condemned Sir Keir for failing to ‘listen’ to the public.
She told the BBC: ‘I wrote as soon as the winter fuel allowance was actually mooted, and I said it was wrong, and therefore I stepped in immediately and used our household support fund to ensure no-one in Doncaster went cold during the winter.’
The increase in national insurance was ‘hitting some of our smaller businesses’ and the squeeze on the personal independence payment was leaving many people ‘worried’, Ms Jones said.
She added: ‘I think the results here tonight will demonstrate that they need to be listening to the man, woman and businesses on the street, and actually deliver for the people, with the people.’
Labour MP Brian Leishman said the by-election result in Runcorn ‘shows Labour must change course’.
In a post on X, the MP for Alloa and Grangemouth said: ‘People voted for real change last July & an end to austerity.
‘The first 10 months haven’t been good enough or what the people want & if we don’t improve people’s living standards then the next government will be an extreme right wing one.’
As Labour’s left wing mobilised, Leeds MP Richard Burgon called for the government to ‘tax the wealthiest’ instead of cutting benefits.
‘By pushing policies like cuts to disability benefits and scrapping the winter fuel allowance, the leadership is driving away our own voters — and letting Reform squeeze through,’ he posted on social media.
‘The Labour leadership must urgently change course and govern with real Labour values to deliver the change people are crying out for. It should start by ditching the plans to cut disability benefits and increase taxes on the wealthiest instead.’
Touring broadcast studios this morning, Tory co-chair Nigel Huddleston tried to put a brave face on the battering.
He dismissed suggestions that Kemi Badenoch could have to quit, saying it was a ‘marathon not a sprint’.
And challenged on whether there now needed to be a merger on the Right, Mr Huddleston said: ‘Reform are not a Conservative party.’
Mr Huddleston told BBC Breakfast of Mr Farage’s claim to be the real opposition: ‘He can’t even manage five MPs previously. We’re (on) 121.
‘In local government, we’ll still have over 4,000 seats most likely after this election.
‘I think that is just not a credible comment from Mr Farage.’
Rifts are emerging on among senior Conservatives over whether to seek an accommodation with Mr Farage – something Ms Badenoch has flatly ruled out.
One Tory frontbencher told today: ‘Reform are not interested in a merger, even if we were – which we’re not.’
Labour chair Ellie Reeves said ‘change takes time’ and acknowledged ‘people are impatient’.
She told Times Radio: ‘Change takes time and we know that people are impatient.
‘We had 14 years of chaos under the Conservatives. Public services and the public finances were left in a state.
‘We’ve had to stabilise the economy, but we’re starting that work. We’ve got our Plan for Change, we’re beginning to see the results of this, but we know we need to go further and faster.’
Ms Pochin said said illegal immigration was a ‘massive issue’ for Runcorn.
She said: ‘People are living next to private landlord accommodation full of illegal immigrants that are causing people’s lives hell.
‘That is an issue that we will absolutely be looking at as the priority.’
She claimed constituents were ‘frightened to go out of their houses’.
She added: ‘It’s a whole area that we will be looking at in detail.’
A Conservative Party spokesman said of Runcorn: ‘This result is a damning verdict on Keir Starmer’s leadership which has led to Labour losing a safe seat.
‘Just 10 months ago Labour won an enormous majority, including in this seat with 52 per cent of the vote, but their policies have been a punch in the face for the people of Runcorn.’
Voters headed to the polls across England in 23 council elections, six mayoral contests, and one parliamentary by-election.
Up for grabs were more than 1,600 council seats, half-a-dozen regional mayors, and the new MP for Runcorn and Helsby.
It is the first big test for Britain’s political parties since last July’s general election, at which Labour secured a landslide win.
Results did not start dropping until after 2am, with mayors and the by-election first.
Council votes will come in later as most do not start counting until the morning.
Polling guru Sir John Curtice said Reform UK ‘are in business’ after the strong performances.
He told BBC Breakfast: ‘The big question we were looking to these elections to answer was, the message of the opinion polls is that Reform are now posing a big threat to both Conservative and Labour, neck and neck with them according to the polls.
‘Is that really true? And I think we now already know that the answer to that question is yes.
‘Ukip never managed to win a parliamentary by-election afresh in the way that Reform have managed to do in Runcorn.’
Sir John said Reform had put in ‘some quite remarkable performances’ as the more evenly spread vote was not a disadvantage to them at local level.
He added: ‘Reform are in business. They are a major challenge.’
Luke Tryl of polling firm More in Common said: ‘While it’s still early we have enough of a spread of results to know the Reform momentum since the election is real and they can turn poll ratings into real votes.’
The parliamentary by-election in Runcorn and Helsby was triggered by Mike Amesbury’s resignation from the House of Commons.
It came after he was jailed for 10 weeks for punching a constituent while drunk in Frodsham, Cheshire, last October.
Amesbury spent three nights in HMP Altcourse, Merseyside, in February before successfully appealing his sentence.
He won Runcorn and Helsby for Labour at July’s general election with a 14,696-vote majority.
Reform came second to Labour in the Cheshire constituency last summer, while the Tories came third – more than 900 votes behind Reform.
Labour has the most seats on Durham Council (52 out of 126), but has been shut out of power for the past four years by a multi-party coalition that includes the Tories, the Lib Dems, Greens and various independents.
Before losing control in 2021, Labour had enjoyed a majority in Durham continuously since 1925.
At this election the council is being reduced in size from 126 to 98 seats, which makes the outcome hard to predict. Labour will hope to regain full control, but is facing a new challenge from Reform.
One senior Labour source told : ‘Durham could be a bigger story than Runcorn.
‘The results were awful last time, I think they will be worse this time.
‘Reform has an outside chance of running the council. Considering we ran the show for 102 years up to 2021 it’ll be devastating.’
Liberal Democrat leader Sir Ed Davey was optimistic about his party’s prospects as polls closed.
‘We are expecting to see big gains against the Conservatives in their former Middle England heartlands,’ he said.
‘Last year the Liberal Democrats won a record number of MPs and became the largest third party in 100 years. Now we are on course for our seventh year of local election gains, making this our best ever winning streak.
‘Voters have delivered their verdict on a Conservative Party that broke the country and a Labour government that is too timid to fix it.’
10pm Thursday
Polling stations close.
Counting begins in the Runcorn & Helsby by-election and in four of the six mayoral contests: Doncaster, Greater Lincolnshire, North Tyneside and West of England.
Four of the 23 local authorities holding elections will start counting: Hertfordshire, Lincolnshire, Northumberland and Staffordshire.
Only one, Northumberland, is due to report all its results overnight; the other three will announce some results overnight, with the rest of the seats being declared later on Friday.
2am Friday
Results are due around this time for two of the mayoral contests.
North Tyneside is one of Labour’s north-east heartlands and the party’s candidate Karen Clark is favourite to win, though a low turnout may mean the result is closer than expected.
The West of England mayor could be a tight race between Labour, the Liberal Democrats and the Greens; Labour’s chances may be affected by the outgoing mayor, Dan Norris, being suspended from the party after he was arrested on suspicion of sexual offences.
3am
Counting should be over in the Runcorn & Helsby by-election, which was triggered by the resignation of the previous MP, Mike Amesbury, after he was given a suspended prison sentence for punching a man in a street in Frodsham, Cheshire.
The result this time is expected to be much closer, with Reform hoping to pull off a shock win.
3.30am
Greater Lincolnshire is one of two new mayoral positions being contested for the first time and is likely to be a two-horse race between the Conservatives and Reform.
The Tories have picked the leader of North Lincolnshire council Rob Waltham, while the Reform candidate is former Tory MP Dame Andrea Jenkyns.
5am
The result of the Doncaster mayoral election is due, with Labour’s Ros Jones hoping for a fourth term in office.
7am
A full set of council results should be in for Northumberland, which is currently run by a Conservative minority administration.
Labour is the main opposition and will hope to improve its standing, though Reform and independent candidates could also make gains, ensuring the council remains in no overall control.
9am
Ballot papers will start to be counted around this time for the remaining two mayoral contests in Cambridgeshire & Peterborough and Hull & East Yorkshire.
Counting will also get under way in those local authorities that did not begin overnight.
1pm
The full result is due for Durham council, where Labour is currently the largest party but does not have a majority and has been shut out of power for the past four years by a multi-party coalition that includes the Tories, the Liberal Democrats, the Greens and various independents.
Labour will hope to regain full control, but is facing an added challenge this time from Reform.
1.45pm
The Tories could see their tiny majority vanish in Lancashire, where Labour, Reform and independent candidates are all hoping to make advances.
2.30pm
The result is due for the new Hull & East Yorkshire mayor.
The Conservatives, Labour and Lib Dems all enjoy support in different parts of this region, while Reform has picked former boxer and Olympic medallist Luke Campbell as its candidate.
3pm
The pace begins to pick up with three councils due to finish declaring.
Doncaster is the only local authority Labour is defending at these elections, but the party faces a big threat from Reform, which is treating the council as a top target.
The Tories are likely to see their numbers cut in both Buckinghamshire and Leicestershire, but could well remain the largest party on both councils.
The result is also due for the Cambridgeshire & Peterborough mayor, which was won by Labour’s Nik Johnson in 2021 but he is not standing this time, and where both the Tories and Lib Dems fancy their chances.
4pm
The losses could start to mount for the Conservatives.
The Lib Dems are hoping to replace the Tories as the largest party in Gloucestershire and Hertfordshire and could make major gains on both councils.
In Shropshire the Conservatives may lose power thanks to a challenge from the Lib Dems, Labour and smaller parties, though they could hang on in Staffordshire where they have a large majority.
4.30pm
Labour did well in the county of Derbyshire at the general election and is hoping to pick up seats on the council this year.
With the Lib Dems and Reform also eyeing gains, the Tories may lose overall control.
5pm
A string of results could bring more gloom for the Conservatives.
Reform is threatening to eat into the Tories’ large presence in Lincolnshire and North Northamptonshire, while the Conservatives’ tiny majority in Nottinghamshire is likely to evaporate in the face of challenges from Reform, Labour and local independents.
The Lib Dems hope to chip away at the Tory numbers in Warwickshire and do well enough in Oxfordshire to take majority control.
In Worcestershire, the story could be one of multiple parties gaining at the Conservatives’ expense, particularly the Greens and Reform.
6pm
More Tory losses may come in Cornwall, where the party has minority control of the council but faces twin threats from the Liberal Democrats and independents.
The Lib Dems are also hoping to wipe out the Conservatives’ majority in Devon and make gains at the Tories’ expense in Wiltshire.
In Cambridgeshire, the Lib Dems are currently the largest party but do not have a majority and will be keen to improve their position.
7pm
The final results are due from Kent and West Northamptonshire: two councils where the Tories currently have a majority but where they face challenges from more than one party.
Reform and Labour are hoping to advance in both areas, while Kent could see gains for the Lib Dems, Greens and independent candidates.