Conservative party

There are two major stories behind the headline results this morning: the rejection of elected mayors and the low voter turnout. Of these, I think the second is the most significant. You can apportion some of the blame to the dreary weather, if you like. But, still, a predicted turnout figure of 32 per cent? That's hardly encouraging. First, though, we shouldn't exaggerate the situation. This wouldn’t be the lowest turnout figure for any local election in history — but the lowest since 2000, when the figure was less than 30 per cent. And it’s also true that turnout has risen for the past three general elections, even if we’re still some way down on the 83.9 per cent achieved in 1950.

The results so far have been good but not spectacular for Labour. The BBC’s national vote share projection has them on 39 percent, the Tories on 31, and the Lib Dems on 16. These numbers would deliver a comfortable Labour majority on both the old and new boundaries. Strikingly, UKIP is averaging 14 percent in the wards it is standing in. This is an impressive result given that UKIP traditionally doesn’t do that well in local elections where Europe is less of an issue.

Tonight, there seems to be a general acceptance that Boris has won London. The talk is of a four points plus victory. But it is worth, of course, remembering that no votes have been counted and there’s been no exit poll. But, sadly, it appears that there will be few other mayoralties created this evening. The opposition of the local political establishment appears to have triumphed in nearly all the cities holding referendums on whether or not to have a mayor. Their loss is Liverpool’s gain which will benefit considerably if it is the largest city outside London with a mayor.

So, after all that, it looks like today’s London Mayoral will be just a little bit of history repeating. YouGov’s final poll predicts that Boris will defeat Ken in the second round by 53 to 47 — exactly the same result we saw four years ago. The third place finisher will probably be the same too: the poll has Brian Paddick getting 7 per cent in the first round, ahead of Siobhan Benita and UKIP’s Lawrence Webb on 4 and Green Jenny Jones on 3. If Boris does overcome Labour’s partisan advantage in London, it won’t be mainly down to his achievements in office. In fact, voters are split 39-38 between Ken and Boris on who’s achieved more as Mayor (although Ken did, of course, have four more years than Boris has so far).

In today’s English council elections, there’s no doubt that Labour will do better than in 2008 — the last time most of these seats were contested. Experts Colin Rallings and Michael Thrasher predict that they’ll improve their ‘national equivalent vote share’ by 13 points compared to four years ago. But how many seats can they pick up of the back of that improvement? Rallings and Thrasher say a figure of 700 would justify a five-point lead in the polls. LSE’s Tony Travers expects Labour’s gains to be around 700-800, and says that: ‘If Labour only manage to put on a further 500 seats, that would be seen as seriously underperforming expectations. Ed Miliband will need 900 gains for a good night.

Here, CoffeeHousers, is this week's episode of The View from 22 podcast. In this episode, Leah McLaren returns to the Spectator a decade on from her infamous cover story attacking British men to explain how she's now fallen in love with one (0:30). James Forsyth and Neil O'Brien from Policy Exchange examine the Tories' lack of progress in the North (6:48) and how elected Mayors will help. Fraser joins in for a discussion of today's local elections and why Labour has the most at stake (16:10). You can listen below with the embedded player or subscribe through iTunes. As ever, we'd love to hear what you think, good or bad.  The View from 22 - 3 May 2012.