Elaine and Danny Blackford are enjoying a quiet cup of coffee in the spring sunshine in Abingdon’s market place. They both have good jobs locally and seem content with their home town in south Oxfordshire. The imposing 17th-century County Hall Museum stands on one side of the square and the ancient parish church of St Nicolas looks down from another. It is an idyllic English scene.
So it feels rather inappropriate to interrupt their peace on a Thursday afternoon to ask about politics, Brexit and how they intend to vote in this week’s local elections, if they do at all. But they seem unsurprised by the questions, and willingly offer strong views. “A farce,” says Danny, grinning. “I am totally disillusioned with national politics.”
Elaine shakes her head and, with a weary smile, describes herself as “just tired of it all”. She adds: “Everyone’s tired of it, aren’t they? I don’t think people will go out to vote next week. The country voted to leave more than two years ago and we have done nothing about it since, except go round and round in circles.”
Across the square, Gordon Philbrook, a retired civil servant, is also more than happy to talk, despite also finding the whole political scene profoundly depressing. “I am completely fed up with the way the government has handled things,” he says, referring primarily to Brexit. “They have made a complete arse of it. And the opposition hasn’t helped. Corbyn is a complete disaster. I don’t see a way forward now.”
The local elections, he believes, will not be fought on local issues but will become entangled in voters’ minds with the national trauma over Brexit – and that will make a mockery of local democracy.
“People will be thinking about Brexit and not whether there will be potholes in the roads any more, and important local issues like that. That is completely crazy,” Philbrook says.
Such opinions are shared throughout the town. If there are concerns about council cuts and traffic congestion, mostly they seem buried under the deep frustration with national politicians that is in the forefront of people’s minds.
“Chaos,” says Allan Cox, a retired engineer, of politics in general. He can’t see himself voting for any of the candidates on Thursday as he believes all parties are as bad as each other. “All I want is a form which says ‘none of the above’ at the bottom. I’d tick that,” he says.
Midterm local elections are normally times to give governing parties, nationally and locally, a kicking and register a protest. This time, however, it is the entire political class that voters seem determined to hurt.
The biggest dilemma for many is whether to bother turning out at all. Danny Blackford takes the view that local elections should not be happening this year. “Why should there be a forum for local elections when all our focus should be on Brexit?” he asks.
Almost 9,000 council seats in England and Northern Ireland will be up for election on Thursday, against a uniquely turbulent national political backdrop. This is almost half of all council seats in England, with most areas affected except London and Birmingham. A third of seats on 49 district councils, 33 metropolitan borough councils and 17 unitary authorities will be contested and all the seats on 119 district councils and 30 unitary authorities.
The Tories are expected to take the biggest pasting – not only because of Brexit and budget cuts forced on all councils, which have closed children centres, libraries and other services, but because when these same seats were last contested in 2015, on general election day, the Conservatives were boosted as voters punished the Lib Dems for their role in the 2010-15 austerity coalition. This time the Conservatives start from a very high base. (In 2015 they gained 504 council seats and Ukip 112 while the Lib Dems lost 425 and Labour 238.)
The omens are not great for Labour this year either. Jeremy Corbyn’s party has performed disappointingly in council byelections over recent weeks, and it already controls most metropolitan areas so will find new conquests hard to achieve. If there are to be winners this year in areas like Abingdon, it could be the Liberal Democrats, and the Greens.
Last Thursday the Lib Dems were out in force in the town while the Tories were nowhere to be seen. The district council currently has 29 Tories and nine Lib Dem councillors. But the Lib Dems are optimistic that they can reverse that on polling day. The pro-EU party may have had a bad time since 2010 but it is still strong locally and the town’s MP is a Liberal Democrat, Layla Moran.
On well-heeled surburban estates away from the centre, resentment and anger with the political class is everywhere. David Cameron is criticised as much for having landed the country in its current mess as Theresa May is for failing to lead it out of it. John Gledhill, an executive with a software company, says Cameron “left us in a hole” and thinks May was dealt a difficult hand. But he has lost patience with the prime minister. “She’s just being pig-headed now, trying to get her deal through parliament when it has been rejected time after time,” he says. “The fact of the matter is that if you don’t like brussels sprouts, you don’t like brussels sprouts. You can’t make people like them. What she is doing is madness.” He will vote Lib Dem on Thursday.
On the other side of the street, retired refrigerator engineer John Thrussell, who normally votes Tory, shares Gledhill’s despair at May. “I think she has tried to please everybody all of the time and you cannot do that. You have to lead,” he says. He will vote on Thursday because he believes it is important to do so. Might he reject the Tories and turn to the Lib Dems?
“You know, I have not decided,” he says. “I have just lost confidence in the whole political system. I am very disillusioned.”
On Thursday, 8,425 local council seats will be contested
Elected councillors have powers to set spending and policy on issues from bin collections to child protection.
The biggest losers could be the Tories
They could lose 1,000 seats as payback for the Brexit deadlock. Labour is also braced for a battering.
The majority of English councils (134) holding elections are Tory-held
Most of these are in rural or suburban areas. Labour’s 67 councils holding elections are largely Midlands unitary or metropolitan councils. Thirty-five councils are run by either a coalition or minority administration. Voters will also elect councillors to the 11 Northern Irish local authorities.
Turnout will be key
Last year only about one in three registered voters went to the polls. In some areas turnout was even lower: in Hartlepool it was 24.2%.
Source: BBC; local government information
