{"id":31628,"date":"2026-05-08T13:21:06","date_gmt":"2026-05-08T13:21:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/31628\/"},"modified":"2026-05-08T13:21:06","modified_gmt":"2026-05-08T13:21:06","slug":"farage-hails-historic-shift-in-british-politics-as-reform-makes-sweeping-local-election-gains","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/31628\/","title":{"rendered":"Farage hails \u2018historic shift in British politics\u2019 as Reform makes sweeping local election gains"},"content":{"rendered":"

Nigel Farage has hailed a \u201ctruly historic shift in British politics\u201d as Reform UK <\/a>swept to victory in local elections <\/a>across the country. <\/p>\n

Speaking in Havering after Reform UK won control of a London council for the first time, a jubilant Mr Farage said he was \u201cthrilled and delighted\u201d at his party\u2019s performance and claimed Reform is now on course to win the next general election. <\/p>\n

Early results showed Labour losing hundreds of councillors<\/a> and eight local authorities across England, while Reform, the Greens and the Liberal Democrats all made gains. <\/p>\n

\"NigelNigel Farage hailed the results as marking ‘historic shift’ in British politics (AFP\/Getty)<\/p>\n

Reform\u2019s gains exceeded 150 seats when results were in from 13 of the 136 councils in the early hours of Friday, while Labour lost more than 120, including in its traditional northern heartlands.<\/p>\n

Asked by reporters whether the success was a result of a protest vote against the Labour government, Mr Farage said: \u201cIt cannot continue to be a fluke or a protest vote.<\/p>\n

\u201cI can honestly say you are witnessing an historic shift in British politics. This (Reform UK) is now the most national of all parties.\u201d<\/p>\n

He told reporters, \u201cthere is no more left-right\u201d as his outfit was \u201cscoring stunning percentages in traditional old Labour areas\u201d, adding: \u201cWe all know that finances of local councils all over the country are severely stretched. We are not promising miracles but we are promising good value for money.\u201d<\/p>\n

Mr Farage compared the substantial gains to clearing Becher\u2019s Brook, a famously difficult jump in the Grand National.<\/p>\n

\"AA rosette worn by a Labour Party candidate during the 2026 Essex County Council election at Clacton Leisure Centre in Essex (Joe Giddens\/PA)<\/p>\n

\u201cIf we cleared Becher\u2019s Brook and landed well, we go on to win the Grand National.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat is very clear to me is that our voters will stick with us now all the way through.\u201d<\/p>\n

Sir Keir\u2019s party went into Thursday\u2019s local elections expected to lose up to 1,850 councillors, with senior figures describing the contest as \u201ctough\u201d.<\/p>\n

Initial results painted a bleak picture for the prime minister, but he insisted he is \u201cnot going to walk away\u201d amid growing pressure on him to resign. <\/p>\n

In Halton, in Cheshire, Labour held two of the 17 seats it was defending as Reform UK gained 15 councillors in the first council to complete its count on Friday morning.<\/p>\n

In some wards, Reform won with more than 50 per cent of the vote in an area where last year Mr Farage\u2019s party won the Runcorn and Helsby by-election by just six votes.<\/p>\n

Although Labour\u2019s starting position means it retains control of Halton Council, the shift in vote share, combined with losses elsewhere in the north west point to a difficult night for Sir Keir.<\/p>\n

Those results included losses to Reform in Chorley, in Lancashire, and Wigan, in Greater Manchester.<\/p>\n

In Hartlepool, Reform won all 12 seats on offer, pushing the previously Labour-held council into no overall control, while Labour also lost control of Redditch, Tamworth and Exeter.<\/p>\n

A national drubbing is likely to reignite speculation about Sir Keir\u2019s leadership of the party and the country.<\/p>\n

Before polls closed, The Times reported that energy secretary and former Labour leader Ed Miliband had privately urged the prime minister to set out a timetable for his departure after the elections.<\/p>\n

Hartlepool MP Jonathan Brash, whose wife Pamela Hargreaves lost her seat in Reform\u2019s clean sweep, said Sir Keir should go.<\/p>\n

He said: \u201cIt\u2019s clear to me that the Prime Minister should take this opportunity to set out a timetable for his own departure, and then allow for the widest possible leadership election that includes all the talents of our party.\u201d<\/p>\n

But deputy prime minister David Lammy urged his party not to play \u201cpass the parcel\u201d with the leadership in response to the election results.<\/p>\n

He told the BBC there were \u201cquestions that we have to answer\u201d but there were \u201cno circumstances in which the answer to the questions that the British people are raising is to change the leader yet again\u201d.<\/p>\n

\"DeputyDeputy Prime Minister David Lammy said the elections had been \u2018tough\u2019 (Dan Kitwood\/PA)<\/p>\n

Labour sources also pointed to the heavy defeat suffered by the party in 1999 before Sir Tony Blair went on to win re-election by a landslide in 2001.<\/p>\n

There were some bright spots for Labour as it clung on in Lincoln and Salford.<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, Mr Farage\u2019s Reform UK is set to make significant gains, building on last year\u2019s local elections that saw the party pick up almost 700 councillors and take control of 10 authorities.<\/p>\n

Early results also showed Reform success further south, with the party picking up seats in Brentwood, in Essex.<\/p>\n

The Greens are also expected to do well, with leader Zack Polanski<\/a> predicting \u201crecord-breaking local elections\u201d for the party.<\/p>\n

He said it would \u201ctake time for the full scale of the Green successes to become clear,\u201d especially in London boroughs to be counted later on Friday, and called for Sir Keir to \u201clisten to the people and go\u201d.<\/p>\n

Sir Ed Davey\u2019s Liberal Democrats, eyeing an eighth successive year of local gains, celebrated taking Stockport and Portsmouth councils, which were previously under no overall control.<\/p>\n

But the Lib Dems lost their majority to no overall control in Hull, losing three seats as Reform gained 10.<\/p>\n

\"GreenGreen Party leader Zack Polanski predicted \u2018record-breaking local elections\u2019 for the party (Zoe Head-Thomas\/PA) (Zack Polanski’s Green Party are also set to eat into Labour’s vote share)<\/p>\n

It could be another bad night for the Conservatives despite an improvement in party leader Kemi Badenoch\u2019s approval rating, with the party expected to lose further ground to Reform, although it managed to hold Harlow in Essex and Broxbourne in Hertfordshire.<\/p>\n

Almost 25,000 candidates were fighting to be elected to more than 5,000 seats on 136 councils across England<\/a>, where six local mayoral contests also took place.<\/p>\n

In Scotland, all 129 seats were up for election at Holyrood while voters in Wales were choosing 96 members of the Senedd.<\/p>\n

Votes in Wales and Scotland are not due to be counted until later on Friday, but both elections are expected to pile further pressure on the Prime Minister.<\/p>\n

Labour faces losing the national vote in Wales for the first time in more than a century, while in Scotland the SNP appears likely to remain the largest party after 19 years in power.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Nigel Farage has hailed a \u201ctruly historic shift in British politics\u201d as Reform UK swept to victory in…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":31629,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[6542,6355,5,6,13741,13474],"class_list":{"0":"post-31628","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-uk","8":"tag-election","9":"tag-horizontal","10":"tag-uk","11":"tag-united-kingdom","12":"tag-vote","13":"tag-voting"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@UnitedKingdom\/116539168016175774","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31628","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=31628"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31628\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/31629"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=31628"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=31628"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=31628"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}