THE party conference season is over, now that both the SNP and Plaid Cymru have held theirs.
While the emphasis in England is on the council and mayoral elections next May, for the Scottish and Welsh nationalist parties all eyes are on the Senedd and Scottish parliament elections then.
Some figures in Britain’s Labour Party are so despairing of the council elections they have already written them off.
Labour went into its conference concentrating on its umpteenth ‘reset’ and hoping for a boost in the polls after the media attention a conference attracts.
It didn’t work. The polls didn’t budge. Labour is in a dire position, trailing at least 10 points behind Farage.
Keir Starmer’s ratings are plumbing record depths. He’s now the most unpopular leader in Europe, even lower than the beleaguered Macron who has had years to alienate his electorate.
The YouGov poll in September showed 71% of British voters hold an unfavourable opinion of Starmer, giving him a net disapproval rating of -50, his worst ever and the worst on record of any prime minister. It has now plunged to -66.
It’s agreed that he has what The Guardian calls a ‘reverse Midas touch’, while the BBC calls it a ‘non-Midas touch’.
Keir Starmer has what The Guardian calls a ‘reverse Midas touch’ (James Manning/PA)
The evidence is that a substantial number of people in Britain – 35% – backed the idea of digital ID in June. However, when Starmer hastily announced his plan for mandatory ID in September, support incredibly sank immediately to -14%.
It may therefore be correct to write off the local government elections but it may also be that Labour advisers are ignoring the real danger which the Scottish and Welsh nationalists pose.
Both John Swinney and Rhun ap Iorwerth reckon they’re on target to win the devolved elections next May.
There’s a revival of support for the SNP and Plaid is running at unprecedented levels of support in Wales, indicating it could be the largest party in the Senedd.
The SNP heads the polls in Scotland at twice the percentage of Labour and miles ahead of Reform, which is taking Labour votes.
In Wales, Labour is a poor third behind Plaid, which is neck and neck with Reform.
Labour is set to lose a by-election in Caerphilly on October 23, a seat the party has never lost. Labour has never lost a Wales-wide election since 1918. Absent the unlikely event of divine intervention, Plaid will win in May.
Leader of Plaid Cymru Rhun ap Iorwerth speaks during the party’s annual conference at the Principality Stadium in Cardiff (Ben Birchall/PA)
John Swinney said at the weekend that if the SNP wins a majority, he will demand an independence referendum.
Starmer has already set his face against that but Swinney says “precedent is on our side” and indicated he will contest in court a refusal of a referendum by Starmer.
How would Scots react to that with support for independence currently at 47%?
Now, think about all that. Labour routed in English councils and mayoral elections is one thing. Labour defeated for the first time across Wales and facing a SNP majority again in Scotland’s parliament is quite another matter.
Labour confined to England, no longer a national British party and facing the demand of the end of the political union the English called Great Britain after they captured Scotland in 1707.
How long would Starmer last after that? Christmas? Would he even make it to the next Labour conference in September 2026?
Surely he would have to resign after such apocalyptic defeats, which at present look likely to happen.
The words febrile and volatile don’t begin to do justice to the feverish, unstable politics in Britain.
No wonder Andy Burnham made an abortive attempt at a heave before the Labour conference. It doesn’t matter that he got nowhere because it wouldn’t have made any difference.
Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer (left) and Mayor of Greater Manchester Andy Burnham (Ian Vogler/Daily Mirror/PA)
The peril lies in Scotland and Wales. Voters there couldn’t care less who runs the Labour Party, because they feel no affinity with the party in England.
What happens in Scotland and Wales is what matters to them and increasingly they feel the need to have more control over their own affairs, though in the case of Plaid, ap Iorwerth says the Senedd election isn’t about independence – one step at a time. It’s about getting rid of Labour, which has taken Wales for granted.
Here, we’re just spectators, for English politicians have long ago forsaken the north.
The daft aspect is that the TUV and some in the DUP think they can interest Reform in the north or even, ridiculously, act as Reform’s agents in the north.
What they should really be doing is thinking about the consequences for this place of the politics of a disunited kingdom.
All bets are off. The message from Scotland and Wales is that radical realignment is certain.
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