Race to be least hated

Neither Keir Starmer nor Kemi Badenoch is looking forward to next month's local elections. For Labour, they are an unwelcome test of the government's popularity.

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Downing Street is resigned to the fact the voters, as is their wont, will use the polls to give the government in power a kicking.

The only saving grace as far as Starmer is concerned is that Labour is defending just 300 seats - so any losses will be limited.

For the Conservatives, the elections will be a sobering reminder of their unpopularity.

The last time this round of local elections was held, Boris Johnson was surfing a post-Covid bounce and Starmer's position was so precarious that he was wobbling over whether to resign or not.

Four years on, it is the Tories hoping they can sink no lower as they defend 900 seats. Even party loyalists fear at least half may be lost to the Lib Dems and Reform.

Yet trying to divine the state of national politics by local election results is like trying to cross the English Channel using a road map.

They can give a rough idea of the position of the big parties, but not the direction of travel.