The run-up to the local elections delivered a depressingly familiar spectacle of the right-wing press firing on all cylinders against its chosen political enemies.

Unsurprisingly, Zack Polanski was at the centre of the storm.

The row stemmed from Polanski reposting criticism of police conduct during the arrest of a man accused of stabbing two Jewish men in Golders Green. Polanski later apologised, admitting he had shared the post in haste.

That should have arguably been the end of it. But instead, the row escalated when the Times faced accusations of fuelling antisemitic sentiment after publishing a cartoon of Zack Polanski by political cartoonist Peter Brookes.

Critics argued that the cartoon did not merely attack Polanski politically but relied on exaggerated visual features long associated with antisemitic caricatures of Jewish people.

In a statement, the Green Party described the cartoon as “deeply irresponsible.”

Many social media users agreed, with comparisons made to the visual propaganda techniques deployed in 1930s Germany under Joseph Goebbels.

What quickly followed were gloating reports about Polanski’s poll ratings being in “free fall” as the Telegraph put it.

Yet while newspapers eagerly amplified every angle of the Polanski controversy, there was notably less interest in stories involving Nigel Farage.

The relative silence around Farage’s reported £5 million backing from British cryptocurrency investor Christopher Harborne, who is based in Thailand and has donated millions to Reform UK, was striking. So too was the muted coverage of Farage posing alongside far-right activists, including a man previously convicted of assault after storming a Stand Up to Racism meeting at a church.

That double standard is the real story. Some politicians, typically on the left, are subjected to days of outrage, saturation coverage and moral grandstanding for every misstep, while others receive remarkably light scrutiny for serious associations and controversies.

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As the country is bombarded with images of a triumphant Nigel Farage and headlines declaring Reform UK the future of British politics, including the Telegraph’s dramatic May 9 splash, “In a once Tory heartland, only hope is Reform,” the reality beneath the local election results may be far less straightforward.

A closer look at the data suggests that, despite the hype, Reform may actually have gone backwards.

Analysis by Sky News economics and data editor Ed Conway examined the National Equivalent Vote (NEV), an estimate projecting local election results into a nationwide vote share. Based on more than three million votes counted, Reform UK emerged ahead on 27%, followed by the Conservatives on 20%. Labour trailed on 15%, while the Liberal Democrats and Greens were level on 14%.

When those figures were translated into a projected redistribution of each party’s seats in the Commons, the result is a hung parliament, with no single party reaching the 326 seats needed for an outright majority.

But more notably still, Reform’s headline-grabbing 27% actually represents a decline compared with last year. On the same measure, the party is down five points from 32%. By contrast, the Conservatives rose from 18% to 20%, despite widespread assumptions that they were collapsing entirely.

Labour also slipped, falling four points from 19% to 15%, while the Liberal Democrats dropped from 16% to 14%.

The real story of the elections, at least on these figures, may instead be the Greens. Their support doubled from 7% last year to 14%, the largest increase of any party.

So, while Reform UK is dominating headlines and racking up council seats, the underlying vote-share data paints a more complicated picture. The party may be benefiting from media momentum, concentrated local gains, and the fragmentation of its opponents more than from any genuine surge in national support.

But as the Guardian’s Andrew Sparrow observed: “Good luck trying to persuade anyone in the party of that, given the number of seats they are winning.”

In other words, Reform UK may be winning the narrative, but not necessarily the argument that it’s unstoppable.

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Labour’s losses in the local elections are set to be lower than expected, while the Greens may have a greater surge than predicted, according to Damian Lyons Lowe, a pollster. 

Counting is still underway in many areas, with most councils due to declare their results over the course of today. A small number of councils, including Tower Hamlets, Bradford, Croydon and Lewisham will not declare until tomorrow. 

Based on the results so far, Lowe, founder and CEO of Survation, has released his predictions on the final outcome of yesterday’s local elections suggests the following parties will make gains:

Reform: +1,419 seats

Green: +685 seats

Lib Dem: + 203 seats

Meanwhile, the Conservatives are predicted to lose 547 English council seats, while Labour is projected to lose 1,231 seats. 

These are heavy losses for Labour, but they are markedly lower than last week’s prediction from Lord Robert Hayward that Keir Starmer’s party could lose 1,850 seats in councils across England.

Michael Thrasher, co-founder of the Local Elections Centre, has also said that Labour may lose 1,200 council seats, rather than the 1,800 he had previously predicted.

In a post on X, Lowe noted that the consensus was that Reform would win over 1,625 seats, suggesting they may slightly underperform compared to expectations. 

He also wrote that the Conservatives’ losses are lower than the consensus that they would lose over 650 seats, meaning they are “holding up a little better than expected”.

On the Greens and Lib Dems, he wrote: “Green +685 vs consensus +588 – outperforming. LD +203 vs consensus +186 – on track.”

Olivia Barber is a reporter at Left Foot Forward

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Tom Watson was the Labour MP for West Bromwich East between 2001 and 2019, and was Deputy Leader of the Labour Party between 2015 and 2019. He now sits in the House of Lords.

This article was originally published on Tom Watson’s Substack

Thursday’s elections will no doubt be reported as a referendum on Keir Starmer. That is partly true, as far as it goes. Governments always get the blame. Prime ministers always carry the can. That is one of the less attractive privileges of the office.

But it would be a mistake to stop there. The polls and projections suggest something larger is happening. This is not simply a judgement on Starmer, or even on Labour. It is beginning to look like a judgement on the two-party system, and on the Whitehall way of governing that has sustained it.

The figures are stark enough. Recent polling has Reform in the mid-twenties, Labour and the Conservatives in the high teens, the Greens in the mid-teens and the Liberal Democrats still very much in the field. Psephologists have pointed to heavy losses for both main parties. Some projections have Labour losing nearly 2,000 council seats, the Conservatives also going backwards, and Reform, the Greens and the Liberal Democrats making the gains.

If it happens, it will represent a fissure in our two-party system.

The sad truth is that many people will not be voting on Thursday for the party they think will run local services best. They will be voting against. Against Labour. Against the Conservatives. Against Westminster. Against a system that feels remote, slow and incapable of doing the things it promises.

Local elections have always carried national messages. That is not new. What feels different this time is the extent to which the local has been crowded out altogether. Nigel Farage and Zack Polanski have helped turn the campaign into a vote about race, migration, Israel, Iran and a whole range of questions which have little to do with who collects the bins most efficiently, fixes the roads or keeps the libraries open.

That does not mean those issues are unimportant. It does mean that the poor councillor defending a record on social care, housing, libraries or potholes may find himself judged on matters over which he has no control at all. Local democracy is often unfair. This year it may be positively brutal.

I can remember two years of terrible results for Labour during the Gordon Brown years. They were a blow. They chipped away at his authority. They added to the sense of a government losing altitude. But they did not stop the daily flow of crises being dealt with in Number 10. The phones still rang. The papers still came in. The decisions still had to be made. Government carried on.

What feels different now is the shape of the punishment. In the Brown years, the system still made a kind of sense. Labour lost. The Conservatives gained. The pendulum moved. The shock was painful, but the mechanism was familiar.

This time, the vote is scattering. Reform gains here. Greens there. Liberal Democrats somewhere else. Independents in places where local anger has found its own candidate. The two-party system is not simply under pressure. It is nose down, hurtling towards the runway, while everyone in the cockpit insists the instruments are being reviewed.

In Wales, the polling tells the same story in a sharper form. YouGov’s MRP has Reform and Plaid Cymru effectively neck and neck, with Labour a distant third. Other polls point in the same direction.

The striking point is not simply Labour’s weakness. It is the wider displacement of the old parties. Labour and the Tories are losing their place in the system. The Conservatives, already weak in much of Wales, risk becoming almost peripheral, while the main contest shifts towards Plaid and Reform.

That is the pattern across Britain. The governing party is being punished, but the official opposition is not the automatic beneficiary. In Wales, as in England, the protest is scattering. Reform takes one kind of discontent. Plaid takes another. Labour falls back. The Conservatives struggle to remain relevant.

That is why Thursday should not be read only as an anti-Starmer election. It is also an anti-Tory election, and a warning about the failure of the old alternation: Labour in, Conservatives out; Conservatives in, Labour out. Voters are not simply changing government. They are changing the terms of two-party politics.

That raises a harder question than whether Starmer has had a bad week. It asks whether the old bargain still holds. Britain’s governing model rests on the idea that a party wins power, commands the Commons, controls Whitehall, sets the direction for local authorities and delivers change. But voters increasingly look at housing, the NHS, social care, migration, energy bills, transport, planning and policing, and conclude that the machine does not work as advertised.

Whitehall still thinks in departments, consultations, reviews and efficiencies. The public thinks in broken appointments, rising bills, unanswered calls and things that never seem to get fixed. The gap between those two worlds is now a political fact.

Kemi Badenoch’s position is not easy either. I may be the only person who thought she was actually doing well as leader. She had begun to sound sharper and more settled. Then she disastrously called it wrong on the Iran conflict and overplayed her hand by calling Keir Starmer a liar. There are moments when an opposition leader must wound the Prime Minister, but the danger is that in doing so, they look less prime ministerial. I cannot help thinking Kemi is too addicted to social media moments rather than long-term strategic clarity.

Ed Davey, whom I like very much, appears to have been forced into chasing the daily media cycle, from Trump to Mandelson and whatever else happens to be passing across the screen. One assumes his team worry that the one-man media machine of Zack Polanski will steal the oxygen. They may be right. But it is not always wise to chase a populist, particularly for liberals.

And what of the potential winners, Polanski and Farage? Their success would tell us as much about the weakness of the old parties as about the strength of the new ones. Both have understood that attention now moves faster than organisation. The danger is that attention is not the same as trust, and noise is not the same as government.

Polanski is certainly a media sensation. No one can deny that. But short-term sensation is not the same as long-term strength. He has allowed his party to be drawn into the hands of people whose political style will be familiar to anyone who watched the autocratic grip placed on Labour under Corbyn. That may work well on TikTok, but he has already turned himself into the riskiest choice for PM in a generation.

And then there is Nigel Farage. He will claim victory on Thursday whatever the numbers say. It is hard to lose from a standing start, especially when you have spent years explaining that every setback proves the establishment is terrified of you. Whether this projects him towards office is another question. A reported £5 million personal gift from Christopher Harborne, now under scrutiny by the Electoral Commission and the parliamentary standards commissioner, ought to matter in the arguments ahead. These are unusual times, though. Perhaps in the new politics, £5 million is just a rounding error. Who knows, in the present climate?

Meanwhile, the people who deserve most sympathy are barely in the national story at all. There are some very fine civic leaders facing serious challenges this week. They will not all deserve the verdict they receive. Many will have worked hard, served decently and tried to hold together public services under impossible pressure.

They are in my thoughts. I have always believed local parties are nothing without their councillors. They are the lifeblood. They are the glue. They keep the organisation alive when the national leadership is popular, and they keep it breathing when it is not.

As commentators say this is going to be the worst night in human history for an incumbent government, one thing can safely be said: Labour has at least got its expectations management right!

Somewhere in Tory and Labour HQ, clever young men and women with lanyards are drafting lines saying they always knew the asteroid was coming and are pleased it has landed broadly within the expected blast radius.

But the more serious point is not the size of the defeat. It is the meaning of the fragmentation. Voters are no longer merely changing sides. They are losing faith in not just the main parties, but the whole system.

That is a much more dangerous thing.

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Reform’s Scottish leader, Lord Malcolm Offord, got humiliated after admitting to having six houses, six boats and five cars during an STV election debate yesterday. 

In an attempt to paint the Green Party as anti-success and anti-business, Offord said that he went to London 40 years ago, with £2,000 in debt and “full of ambition”.

He said that he “worked hard” and was successful, and that “Today, I own six houses, five cars and six boats”. Offord also said he has paid £45 million in tax through his business. 

He was then laughed at as he said: “I don’t say that to boast”.

Offord then asked the Scottish Green Party co-leader, Ross Greer, if the Greens would want more or less people like him in Scotland.

Greer fired back: “Fewer people like you. I’m glad you’ve finally admitted how many homes that you have, Lord Offord.”

Greer continued: “I think it’s worth at this point in the debate pointing out that there are three times as many holiday homes and empty properties in this country as there are homeless children. 

“You don’t need six homes, you don’t even need two homes, everybody just needs a home to live in.”

Greer said that to tackle the housing crisis, “super rich elite individuals” like Offord “should be giving up some of those homes” so that people without a home can have somewhere to live.

Offord looked down at the podium as Greer gave his answer, and then changed the subject when he was given the opportunity to respond to the Green MSP. 

Olivia Barber is a reporter at Left Foot Forward

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With less than two weeks to go until the 2026 Scottish Parliament election, when voters will elect 129 MSPs – 73 constituency and 56 regional – a growing body of polling is shaping expectations for both the electoral outcome and Scotland’s constitutional future.

Two polls released this week suggest that a majority of Scots could now favour independence. A Find Out Now survey of more than 1,000 respondents, commissioned by James Kelly of the pro-independence blog Scot Goes Pop, found that 53 percent would vote ‘Yes’ in a referendum when undecided voters are excluded. Including ‘don’t knows,’ support stands at 50 percent for independence and 44 percent for remaining in the UK.

The poll also indicates that the SNP is on course to dominate the constituency vote with 35 percent, well ahead of Reform UK on 16 percent. Scottish Labour follows on 14 percent, with the Scottish Greens at 12 percent, the Scottish Liberal Democrats on 10 percent, and the Scottish Conservatives on 9 percent.

On the regional list vote, the SNP is projected to win 27 percent, with the Greens in second place on 20 percent. Reform  follows on 17 percent, ahead of Labour on 12 percent, the Liberal Democrats, 11 percent, and the Conservatives, 10 percent.

These figures point to a potentially strong combined showing for pro-independence parties.

According to pollster James Kelly, nine out of fifteen polls conducted so far this year have found a majority in favour of independence.

The data also reveals a notable generational divide, that support for independence is strongest among people in their 30s, 68 percent ‘Yes’ to 27 percent ‘No,’ while opposition is highest among those aged 65 to 74, 69 percent ‘No’ to 26 percent ‘Yes.’

The polling suggests the Greens could achieve a record result, raising the possibility of a substantial pro-independence majority at Holyrood. However, the SNP alone is projected to fall short of an outright majority, potentially complicating the path to a second independence referendum.

A separate poll by Survation for Ballot Box Scotland places the SNP on 35 percent in constituency voting and 29 percent on the regional list, which would translate into around 57 seats. The Greens are projected to win a record 11 seats based on 11 percent of the list vote.

In that poll, Reform UK and Labour are tied on 20 percent in the constituency vote, followed by the Conservatives on 13 percent and Liberal Democrats on 10 percent. On the regional list, Reform leads on 19 percent, ahead of Labour, 17 percent, the Conservatives, 13 percent, and the Liberal Democrats, 8 percent.

The survey also asked voters which party they would least like to see in the next Scottish Government. Reform UK topped that measure at 34 percent, followed by the SNP on 17 percent and Labour on 14 percent.

The polls suggest that while no single party may secure a majority, the balance of the next Scottish Parliament could hinge on the combined strength of pro-independence parties.

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Plaid Cymru is on track to become the largest party in the Senedd elections on 7 May, and just six short of the 49 needed for a majority.

According to YouGov’s first MRP model poll for the Senedd elections, Plaid Cymru is projected to win 43 out of 96 seats in the Welsh Parliament, thereby ousting Labour from government in Wales. 

The poll, conducted by YouGov, found that right now, the current voting intention of people for the Senedd is as follows: 

Senedd voting intention:

• Plaid Cymru – 33 (-4)
• Reform UK – 27 (+4)
• Welsh Labour – 13 (+3)
• Wales Green Party – 12 (-1)
• Welsh Conservatives – 7 (-3)
• Welsh Liberal Democrats – 5 (n/c)
• Others 4 – (+2)

Plaid, alongside the Greens or Labour, would command a majority in the Senedd. However, Plaid Cymru leader Rhun ap Iorwerth said in January that he would prefer to form a minority Plaid government over a coalition with another party.

According to the poll, Labour is expected to lose 32 seats, leaving them with 12 seats and a 23% drop in their vote share. 

The current first minister, Labour’s Eluned Morgan, is expected to lose her seat.

Meanwhile, Reform UK, which won 1% of the vote in the 2021 Senedd elections, is projected to win 30 seats.

The Conservatives and the Lib Dems are facing  potential wipeouts, with the former projected to hold on to just one seat, while the Lib Dems may not win any. 

YouGov’s new MRP methodology uses data on how people plan to vote at a constituency level, which accounts for tactical voting, to estimate how a party is likely to perform nationally.

Olivia Barber is a reporter at Left Foot Forward

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If the anti-woke clan has a set of favourite villains, the so-called ‘eco zealots’ must rank near the top. When they are not delighting in the arrest of Greta Thunberg, detained in December after attending a protest linked to jailed members of Palestine Action, their attention often turns to other environmental campaigners. One frequent target is the veteran naturalist and broadcaster Chris Packham.

In a column for GB News, celebrity doctor and TV presenter Renee Hoenderkamp described Packham as a “vile man.” She reminded readers of a remark he once made suggesting that those who reject environmental action might as well stand in a bucket of oil and set fire to themselves, presenting the comment as literal incitement rather than what it almost certainly was, hyperbolic rhetoric.

Hoenderkamp’s central grievance, however, is Packham’s supposed hostility to farmers. According to her column, “Chris doesn’t care about” rural communities. From trail hunting to pig farming, she argued, his criticism is relentless, and his frequent media appearances make him appear to speak for the public.

Yet this portrayal sidesteps an awkward reality: public opinion is already far more critical of modern farming practices than the column suggests.

During the YouTube documentary Greenwashed, Packham floated the idea of putting shocking images of industrial farming on meat packaging, similar to the warning labels placed on cigarette packets. Critics dismissed the suggestion as extremist but the reaction overlooks a key point: many consumers already have serious concerns about how animals are treated.

Research supports this. A 2025 report by Bryant Research found that between 75% and 96% of the UK public oppose common animal farming practices. According to the report, every practice presented to respondents, from intensive confinement to other standard industry procedures, was judged unacceptable by a large majority.

In other words, Packham’s criticism isn’t not as far removed from public sentiment as his critics imply.

The debate becomes even more complex when investigations into farming conditions are considered. The People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) has released footage from British farms, including facilities audited under the ‘Red Tractor’ label, that appears to show animals living in cramped, unsanitary environments and suffering injuries or untreated illnesses.

Campaigners argue that such scenes undermine the reassuring image often presented to consumers. Animals marketed as part of ‘ethical’ British farming are, critics claim, frequently kept in conditions far removed from what’s considered ideal.

Hoenderkamp’s column ultimately broadens into a wider critique of veganism, warning that plant-based diets can lead to deficiencies in nutrients such as vitamin B12, iron and calcium.

While nutritional concerns are legitimate, they are hardly unique to vegan diets. Dietitians regularly point out that well-planned vegan diets can meet nutritional needs, just as poorly planned omnivorous diets can also lead to deficiencies.

The portrayal of environmentalists as reckless “eco zealots” makes for an easy headline, yet it obscures the fact that figures like Chris Packham may use provocative language, but many of the issues they raise, animal welfare, transparency in farming, and the environmental impact of food production, reflect concerns shared by a significant chunk of the public.

Dismissing those concerns with caricatures may generate outrage and clicks on GB News. It does little, however, to address the underlying questions about how food is produced, how animals are treated, and what kind of agricultural system the public actually wants.

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British opposition to the US military action in Iran is rising, according to new YouGov polling.

Polling carried out on 9 March found that 59% of Brits now oppose or strongly oppose the US-Israeli strikes on Iran.

This marks a 10-point increase from last week, when 49% of Britons said they opposed US military action against Iran.

On the tenth day of military action, support for the strikes on Iran has also fallen by three points, from 28% to 25% since 2 March. 

Support for the US attacks is highest among Reform voters, with 57% saying they somewhat or strongly support the war.

Opposition to the war is strongest among Green, Labour and Lib Dem voters. The poll revealed that 87% of Green voters somewhat or strongly oppose the war, while 81% of Lib Dems and 76% of Labour voters are against it. 

As opposition to the attacks on Iran grows, senior Reform figures appear divided on the issue, though Nigel Farage and Richard Tice have expressed support for the strikes. 

Robert Jenrick MP has said that Reform would not send UK troops to join in the strikes, and that the party wants to “see the war come to an end as quickly as possible”.

By contrast, Farage said the UK “should do all we can” to help the Americans.

Asked if Reform would instruct the RAF to take part in bombing Iran, Tice said if Reform were in power “we would be helping the Americans and the Israelis in any way they saw appropriate”.

Olivia Barber is a reporter at Left Foot Forward

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The Green Party has overtaken Labour to climb into second place in the polls, days after its victory in the Gorton and Denton by-election.

The Greens are up four points on 21%, putting it just two percentage points behind Reform UK on 23%. YouGov said that this is the highest level of support for the Greens it has ever recorded.

The YouGov poll shows that people’s current voting intention in a parliamentary election is as follows:

Reform UK 23% (-1)

Green 21% (+4)

Labour 16%(-2)

Conservatives 16%(-2)

Lib Dem 14%(nc)

Meanwhile, Reform’s lead in the polls continues to narrow. In this YouGov poll for the Times and Sky News, Reform’s projected vote share fell by one percentage point. 

In another recent poll carried out by Lord Ashcroft Polls, Reform dropped by three percentage points to 22%. 

A Green Party source told Sky News’ Beth Rigby: “We are coming for Reform and on the path to replacing Labour. Voters have been let down time and time again by high bills, toxic rhetoric on migration and failure to make real change to improve people’s lives. 

“Gorton and Denton showed that if people vote Green, they can get Green. Starmer can smear us as much as he wants but the voters want change and increasingly see the Greens as the party to break the failed status quo.”

Olivia Barber is a reporter at Left Foot Forward

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Sadiq Khan has told Keir Starmer to ditch his “flawed strategy” of taking progressive voters for granted, after Labour came third in the Gorton and Denton by-election last week.

The Mayor of London criticised the prime minister for branding the Green party “extreme”, and said that trying to compete with Reform is “inauthentic” and a betrayal of Labour values.

In an article for the Guardian, Khan said that “there was no sugar-coating” that losing Gorton and Denton, a seat Labour had held for nearly a century, was “a terrible result”.

Khan stated that “A political strategy of taking liberal, progressive voters for granted is clearly flawed. The national Labour party and government doesn’t just need to reflect on this result, but fundamentally rethink its approach.”

He added that “the vast majority of those who are thinking of voting Green are not extreme”, and that “calling them extreme will only turn more people away”.

Khan referred to how he has called out Trump for racism and sexism, and lobbying for the UK to rejoin the EU customs union and spoken out about the killing of Palestinians. 

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Khan said: “Staying quiet on these issues and trying to compete with Reform on the right of politics not only feels inauthentic – at a time when authenticity is more prized in politics than ever – but a betrayal of what Labour is supposed to represent. We must address the concerns and fears of voters, not play on them.”

Khan praised Starmer’s “good work” on free breakfast clubs and workers’ rights, and added that he was not calling for Starmer to resign. 

However, he said he felt the prime minister’s achievements were being overshadowed by “missteps and political positioning” on issues such as Gaza, Brexit and migration.

Olivia Barber is a reporter at Left Foot Forward

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The Labour Party has been criticised for sharing a bar chart of a recent poll on social media that omitted the Green Party. 

A poll commissioned by Byline Times and carried out by Opinium ahead of tomorrow’s by-election in Gorton and Dernton, showed the Greens tied with Labour at 28%, and Reform at 27%.

Among people who said they would most likely vote on Thursday, Greens had a lead of 30%, with Labour and Reform on 28% each.

Labour missed the Greens off the graphic. They shared the graphic with the caption: “BREAKING: new poll suggests there is just one point between Labour and Reform in Gorton and Denton.

“Every vote will count on Thursday. Back Labour and choose unity over Reform’s division.”

Stats for Lefties called Labour “shameless” for sharing the graphic without including the Greens.

Jeremy Corbyn’s former spokesperson Matt Zarb-Cousin wrote on X: “You missed a bit”. 

Labour has also accused the Greens of sharing “dodgy” bar charts. 

Lucy Powell recently wrote to Green Party leader Zack Polanski expressing concern about “a number of misleading claims” the Greens have made which she said “may lead to Reform getting in through the back door”. 

Powell said to Polanski: “Your bar charts would even make your former Lib Dem colleagues blush.”

Professor Rob Ford, a political scientist at the University of Manchester, recently told FullFact: “Both parties really want to be able to claim the mantle of the main ‘anti-Reform’ party in the seat but the truth is there is no reliable data available, from polling or other sources, which can be used to decisively evidence such a claim.”

An Omnisis poll published at the end of last week had the Greens on 33%, Reform on 29% and Labour on 26%.

Britain Predicts’ forecast for tomorrow’s by-election has the Greens on 31%, Reform on 30% and Labour on 29%. 

However, Ben Walker, a New Statesman journalist who runs the forecaster, says the result  is “anyone’s guess” because the Greens, Reform UK and Labour are neck and neck. 

Olivia Barber is a reporter at Left Foot Forward

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