Kemi Badenoch has woken up with a spring in her step this morning after local election results overnight suggested the party is beginning a long-awaited comeback after the 2024 general election.
While the Tories have lost dozens of council seats, crucial battlegrounds across London have proved surprisingly positive for the party.
Ms Badenoch’s team has bucked the trend against recent polls, all of which said the Tories were no-hopers in major councils like Wandsworth and Westminster.
But this morning, residents in both affluent areas are waking up to Conservative-run councils for the first time since 2022.
In Westminster, which includes major areas such as the Houses of Parliament, the West End, and Belgravia, the Tories took 32 seats to Labour’s 22.
The party had run the council since its creation in 1965, before losing it in an anti-Boris wave four years ago.
Tory sources were particularly delighted to defeat two high-profile defectors who were standing for election in Abbey Road ward- a prominent think-tanker from the Henry Jackson Society, Alan Mendoza, and former MP Damien Moore.
A source told the Daily Mail: ‘Bye-bye failed Tories’.
Kemi Badenoch has pulled off unexpected victories in crucial councils in London
The Tories believe they have begun building back since last year’s disastrous local elections, increasing their overall vote share
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South of the river in Wandsworth, once known as ‘Thatcher’s favourite council’, which had a notorious track record of keeping council tax very low, the Tories also succeeded in taking the crown back from Labour.
Having also lost the authority in 2022, this morning the Conservatives took 29 seats to Labour’s 28.
One independent councillor was also elected, with the Tories claiming that they have been given reassurances by Malcolm Grimston that he will not prevent them from running the area.
Ms Badenoch also fended off a major effort from Reform UK in Bexley, south-east London.
The Tories held Bexley despite a recent MRP poll suggesting they were neck-and-neck with Mr Farage’s party.
But while there are still seats to declare, the Tories hold enough seats to control the target, and Reform have just a single-figure amount of councillors elected.
Similarly in Harlow, the Tories were defending six of the 11 seats up for election.
The Tory leader of the council, Dan Swords, said: ‘Reform said they would win all 11.’
‘The Conservatives won all 11 – with record turnout and majorities. Phenomenal.’
Ms Badenoch spent the final day of campaigning in areas like Wandsworth and Croydon, with results suggesting this focus has born fruit
Victorious Conservative councillor Philip Stephenson-Oliver celebrates his victory at the Westminster count
Reform UK did put on a strong showing in outer London, while failing to secure Bexley. The Party won its first-ever London council in Havering this morning, taking at least 28 of the council’s 55 available seats.
Mr Farage hailed it as a ‘historic shift in British politics’.
Meanwhile his colleague, Robert Jenrick, said this morning that both the Tories and Labour ‘have been completely buried’.
Speaking to the Daily Mail this morning, a source close to Kemi Badenoch said that while there are still ‘really difficult places yet to come in’, the results overnight prove that the Tories are ‘coming back’.
They explained: ‘There’s a lot of the really difficult places yet to come in, so we’re not counting our chickens.
‘But YouGov and More in Common didn’t have us taking Wandsworth and Westminster. They had us losing out in Bexley – where we’ve not only held on but increased some of our majorities.
‘There’s a real sign we’re coming back in places. These are tough elections for us. But we’re coming back from our historic lows’.
According to the Tories, they believe their overall vote share this year will be around 18 per cent, a rise of six points since the last set of local elections.
Asked if there’s a risk the Tories may become a Right-wing party only present in the capital, while losing the rest of their footings to Reform UK, the top source added: ‘We’re obviously fighting across the country.
‘The fact is these were – for the most part – the urban north and midlands, which has traditionally been more Labour dominated.
‘But in more rural parts of the North we have shown we can hang on.’
They reiterated denials that Ms Badenoch would now be planning on a reshuffle of her shadow cabinet, insisting that the Tory leader is ‘very happy with her team’ and the U-turns they’ve been securing from the Government in Westminster.
