Will these elections change our political landscape?

The 2025 local elections in England and Wales are of unusual significance. Things are volatile, but some trends are already very clear.

- SEAN O'GRADY

Coupled with the Runcorn by-election, they will show, in dramatic fashion, the increasing fragmentation of the British party system. Labour and the Conservatives are being challenged as never before on a national basis by the combined disruptive forces of Reform UK, the Liberal Democrats and the Greens – and in Wales and Scotland, the choices presented to the voters also include their respective nationalist parties, Plaid Cymru and the SNP.

This far exceeds any of the past dislocations to have affected the party system. What is going on?

How kaleidoscopic is the new party system?

Very. At the moment, according to the opinion polls, Labour and the Conservatives – combined – command about 45 to 50 per cent of the vote. At the last general election, the figure was 57.4 per cent. Compare that with previous challenges to the two main parties, when the old couple achieved combined totals of 67.3 per cent in 2010, 70 per cent in 1983, and 75.1 per cent in February 1974.

The now-disappearing two-party monopoly peaked at the 1951 election, when Labour and the Tories won 96.1 per cent of the vote (on a 82.6 per cent turnout). In many areas there is now a three-, four-, or even five-party system; and regional mayoralties will have been won on less than 30 per cent of the vote (and only on the votes of, say, 10 or 15 per cent of the electorate as a whole).