To think Starmer will be gone by the end of Friday? Or will it be Monday evening?

[SingleSexSpacesInSchools]

Whoever you are voting for today, it's probably not Labour - they might loose 2,000 seats.

How long exactly will it be before he resigns?

My actual prediction is that today will be so bad Starmer will be forced out in some way.

Well it’s not looking that bad at the moment. More than half the councils declared and less than 500 seats lost. Remind me what you were confidently predicting yesterday?

That's actually slightly better than the polls were predicting.

I think I meant ten seats not 10%, maybe out of 96?

Again, the primary prediction is today is so bad, Starmer is forced out. That tune is already being played across X and political media and has been since about 8am.

from the BBC about 45m ago

"The rate of Labour seat losses has picked up again. The party is now losing well over 50% of the seats it is trying to defend.
Indeed, outside London the figure is no less than three in four.
It still looks possible that the total of Labour's losses may not be far short of the 1,500 mark."

The Conservatives won the 2010 general election, two years later in the 2012 local elections they lost 403 seats and 12 councils. Labours loss today is being framed by the media as unprecedented; it's not it's nothing of the sort. It's comparable to other local elections.

Still only 446 🤷‍♀️

Labour have lost over 450 seats so far and still counting.

The polls were predicting that Labour would be down to 4 seats with 9% of the vote. If they actually manage 10 seats that will be a huge success relative to the polls, although still a poor result compared to the previous election.

446 according to the Beeb.

I'm pissed off. My councillor was brilliant (Labour). I vote for my MP and councillor as they are good at their jobs and care. I don't care about them being Labour or not (my MP wasn't for a while because of Starmer thinking sacking people is a show of strength and not weakness). My councillor has been replaced by Reform, and he may well be decent, but I'm not holding out a great deal of hope given their ideology on disabilities. My son is severely disabled.

I have always been lenient in Starmer and wanted him to do well, but my patience has gone with him now. The PIP and DLA reforms were the thing that lost people from the both right and left. Such a stupid mistake. We need a better PM.

He might not go. There’s no one credible to replace him. So he might just limp on. 🤷‍♀️

Peter Kellner is a former Newsnight journalist. He has a more measured, less hysterical take

Peter Kellner’s 3 early points

1 Reform did less well than last year
2 Labour and Tories did better
3 Greens vote spread too thinly to convert share similar to Lab/Con/LibDem into seats

https://kellnerp.substack.com/p/yesterdays-elections-the-story-so

Reform got 41% of all seats contested last year in local elections - now at 33%

And you know - when the count is done - you can make that call - but % wise the losses are far far higher than that

Not to mention the Sened, the mayor elections and Scotland

Thank you @MrsFinkelstein. Kellner’s always been a cool, calm voice.

No, why should be be gone?

Scot here - the SNP will likely win majority of seats, I'm not sure it'll be an outright majority though, their vote share has fallen.

Edit to add - I see Flynn had a bit of a squeaky bum moment in Aberdeen. Won't stop him challenging Swinney though.

And again the disrespect towards the Welsh parliament! Come on, it's not hard. It's the Senedd. Two ds.

If you get Polanski onto it you might be able to push the boat out and manifest a pair of EEs.

Unison leader calls for Starmer to go - https://x.com/AndreaEganGS/status/2052749311641841782?s=20

Extreme left wing opponent of Starmer calls for Starmer to go shocker! She isn't even a member of the Labour party - she was expelled in 2022.

It’s the largest union and they do matter to Labour.

Maybe she’s not speaking for her membership. Just a thought ….

I am amazed at the Labour reaction on this thread (and it is Labour reaction: the pro comments aren’t from disinterested floating voters). Even if Labour only loses 1,000 seats (unlikely) and loses Wales and fails in Scotland (certain), why on earth isn’t the consensus one of throwing Starmer out? He’s going to reduce Labour to complete irrelevance forever.

That may already have happened to the Tories - sadly IMO - but does Labour really want to be in that position? There’s nothing in it for Labour to stick with Starmer. It will just get worse. But that’s Labour’s funeral, I guess.