What are Labour’s prospects in future elections ?
Although 2029 is a long way ahead, and the leadership and cabinet will be focused on immediate policy decisions, their advance planners should already be thinking about their electoral prospects…and not just for the next general election. The reason why they should be concerned at this early stage is that the local elections are only a little over 6 months away, so the first ‘day of reckoning’ at the ballot box is, relatively speaking, nigh. Does this really matter, though ? The answer is that it does…the brunt of any early disapproval by the electorate (and there’s plenty of that around just now!) will fall on local Labour councillors, many of whom come up for re-election next year and will be worried about retaining their seats on May 1 st . In one sense, this is a pity, since Local politics is by its nature less overtly political than the national variety, and involves a lot more cross-party collaboration – it simply has to, in order to get things done at a local level.