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Labour suffers reverses

Hasan Suroor

LONDON: As expected, the Labour Party was headed for bruising losses in Thursday's "mini'' general elections with initial results on Friday throwing up heavy reverses for the party, especially in England and Wales.

But in Scotland it was hoping to avert a meltdown despite early losses to its main rival, the Scottish Nationalist Party (SNP), which was widely expected to emerge as the single largest party.

SNP leader Alex Salmond, hoping to form Government, claimed that a "wind of change'' was blowing with Labour set to lose an election in Scotland for the first time since 1955.

But leader of the Scottish Labour Party Jack McConnell dismissed the SNP claims as "presumptuous'' though he admitted that it had been the "toughest and most hotly contested election in Scottish history''. Both Mr. Salmond and Mr. McConnell won their seats. Labour's hopes were boosted after a BBC survey showed that the contest for the Scottish Parliament was too "close to call''. But with results of only half the seats declared until late in the afternoon the picture was still not clear and the big question remained whether the Labour Party would be able to cling on to power.

In Wales, too, the situation remained hazy but, judging by early results, Labour was likely to fall short of the half-way mark, needed to gain a majority, in the 60-member Assembly. Though even at the last election it did not have a majority it had emerged as a sufficiently significant single largest bloc to form a minority Government.

This time, its strength is likely to be significantly reduced, raising the possibility of a coalition between the Welsh Nationalist Party Plaid Cymru and the Liberal Democrats. If early trends continued, Labour could lose power both in Scotland and Wales. But in both regions Tories failed to capitalise on Labour losses and were struggling. In the local Council elections in England, however, Tories were on course to emerge as a major factor, mostly at the cost of Labour.

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