Conservative local election performance worse in south than anywhere else in country

All the parties have something to cheer.

Labour’s win in Worthing was their highlight, and they were celebrating in Southampton too.

The Lib Dems gained seats almost everywhere but only took control of one council - Gosport.

The Greens made gains as well - including three seats in Hastings, which meant Labour lost their majority there.

And the Tories will take heart from the fact that although they did badly, it wasn’t catastrophic.

Overall, the Tory performance was worse in the south than elsewhere in the country.

West Oxfordshire, Wokingham, Maidstone - many traditional Tory strongholds in our region don’t feel quite so true blue now.

But Labour and the Lib Dems have a mountain to climb if the progress they’ve made today is to be turned into victories at the next general election.

There are very few marginal Tory-held seats in the south. And constituency boundary changes will probably make their task even harder.

After all the speculation about his leadership, Boris Johnson lives to fight another day. The partygate crisis isn’t over yet of course - although Sir Keir Starmer is now being investigated for allegedly breaking Covid rules too.

But the biggest problem for Mr Johnson is the economy.

There’s been growing pressure on the Government to do more to protect people from the effects of soaring inflation. That pressure will intensify over the next few weeks.

One of the pleas the Conservatives will have heard from voters in the south is for more action to help them through the crisis.

That will dominate everything in Westminster over the next few months. How the Government responds might well determine the result of the next general election.