UK

In the run-up to the local elections, the silence finally shattered: suddenly it was acceptable to talk about the problem of men without proper vetting crossing international borders. That v-word that working-class communities are so severely reprimanded for using was on the lips of every Westminster hack. Across SW1, manicured hands were wrung over the scandal of an unscreened bloke getting a cushy house and government money in a country that isn’t his own. Of course, none of this chatter was about the men from distant, regressive lands who rock up on England’s shores every day – it was about Peter Mandelson.

In 35 years at sea, HMS Iron Duke only ever fired her guns in anger a handful of times. She did so to hit a gun battery during the war against Colonel Gaddafi in Libya in 2011, and before that while seizing drugs in the Caribbean in 2009.

For a Type 23 frigate, designed in the 1980s to take on the might of the Soviet navy, it was small-scale stuff. But at a time when the Cold War seemed long over, it was a reminder that a well-resourced navy still had its uses.

Here are some phrases I don’t want to hear today. ‘Protest vote.’ ‘The cry of the “left behind”.’ ‘A bloody nose for the establishment.’ For while it’s true that the colourless functionaries of our two-party regime will be holding their bloodied snouts today following a bruising blow from the electorate, none of those trite phrases captures the historic nature of what is happening. This is not just a ballot-box ‘screw you’ – it’s an attempted reordering of politics itself by voters with nothing left to lose.

Keir Starmer is desperately fighting to subdue a Labour revolt tonight after a local elections bloodbath saw the party routed on English councils, and destroyed in Wales and Scotland.

Loyalist ministers and MPs have been deployed in a frantic bid to prop up the PM, after a series of backbenchers broke cover to demand his resignation.

So far no Cabinet ministers have publicly joined the mutiny – a moment that many believe would be the final nail in Sir Keir’s coffin.

These results are more than a warning for Keir Starmer and Labour — they signal a deeper collapse in the old order and a shift to Reform and the Greens

The first possible mistake will be to compare the result with expectations. Because some forecasts saw Labour losing 70 per cent of its seats, there might be reports which position losing, say, half their seats as a relief. Yet if a discrepancy does emerge between forecasts and outcome that is a piece of information only about forecasters. The information about Labour remains an utter disaster wherever in the range it lies.

Similarly the test for the Conservatives cannot be that they have failed to be utterly obliterated. It’s terrible for the main opposition party to be losing seats on this scale.

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‘Delusional’ Starmer urged to go by Labour MPs, ministers and unions as local elections ‘disaster’ sees Reform smash through Red Wall strongholds

Keir Starmer is under pressure to set out a timeline for his departure after a crushing defeat in elections across Britain prompted senior Labour MPs to call for him to step down within a year.

In a disastrous set of results, Labour had lost control of more than 25 councils and almost 1,000 council seats in England by Friday evening, many to Nigel Farage’s Reform UK, which made large gains across the Midlands and the north as well as taking seats from the Tories in the south.

After more than a century of domination, Labour has faced near-wipeout in Wales, where the party’s first minister, Eluned Morgan, lost her seat. Labour could slump to third place in Scotland behind the SNP and Reform. In London, a Green surge meant Labour lost control of councils it had dominated, including Hackney and Waltham Forest.

Labour loses Wales for the first time ever as mutinous MPs blame Starmer for once-in-a-generation elections disaster – with Greens racking up seats and Reform rampant

Keir Starmer entered Downing Street promising the political equivalent of a monastery. He was silent on matters of substance, except to say that his administration would be founded on integrity, service, and an end to scandal—a government ‘whiter than white’ with the adults, finally, back in the room. No more circus. No more rogues. Just a decent, serious man restoring trust after the bacchanal of Boris Johnson and a Tory party that went through leaders like others are rumoured to go through Ukrainian rent boys. Exhausted by 14 years of Tory chaos, the nation acquiesced to the Ming vase strategy.