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Labour on edge over local elections

LONDON: The Labour Party was on tenterhooks on Thursday as Prime Minister Gordon Brown faced his first electoral test in his 11-month leadership with voters across England and Wales casting their votes in local elections, including the London mayoral contest.

Opinion polls projected a grim picture of Labour’s prospects with the party set to lose hundreds of council seats. And a big question mark hung over the fate of its incumbent London Mayor Ken Livingstone.

The revived Tory party, under David Cameron, was said to be on a roll with pre-poll surveys giving it a substantial edge over Labour in council elections though the London mayoral race was still in “dead heat.”

Pollsters suggested that if the Tories were able to get 40 per cent of the popular vote, they could be set to win the next general election that could be held as early as next year or at latest by 2010.

Ruling parties have seldom done well in local elections because of the so-called incumbency and commentators said much would depend on the scale of Labour’s projected losses. A rout would increase pressure on Mr. Brown, who is already struggling to get a grip on things after many political crises.

All eyes were on the London mayoral election, where Mr. Livingstone was fighting for survival against Boris Johnson, a bumbling Right-wing Etonian who is not taken seriously even among Tories. At the start of the race, he was seen as an outsider and a no-hoper against a seasoned Mr. Livingstone. However, in recent weeks, he has emerged as a likely winner on the back of a virulent “anti-Ken” campaign by the Tory press.

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