Stephen Bush

I have, yep.

So I might start to sundown during the pod.

Halfway through.

It is falling short of some of the worst predictions, but it is worth noting that although numerically...

it looks like the Labour Party will end up with it, being able to go, oh, look, if you look at the numbers we lost in 1999 and the numbers we've lost now, they're about the same.

In 1999, they were defending a much larger number of seats.

So in percentage terms, this is an apocalyptically bad set of results thus far.

I really cannot overstate enough that this is at the upper end of what we're doing.

This is a record-breakingly bad result.

election, unless every everywhere from here, you know, stays red.

We are talking worse than Margaret Thatcher in 1981, which is the current that is the floor standard to be that is the worst performance by a government that went on to be reelected.

So this is far worse than your usual off-year blues for the Labour Party.

It's a much smaller number.

Now, the...

If I were a Labour spinner looking for something that was both positive to say but grounded in some truth, the interesting thing is thus far, that is a better performance than what they have done in individual council by-elections, right?

Which, if your argument is, look, in local elections, people know that they can kick the boss, particularly in large chunks of the north, whereas Jen says they elect in thirds, so it does not matter at all, right?

Your Labour council's not going to change at all.

One of the things they tried to do in lots of their leaflets...

across Greater Manchester was to do a kind of like, hey, remember to keep Andy on the front page, basically like re-elect this guy because the combined authority means and the local authorities really do matter.

It does appear thus far with the important disclaimer that most of the London councils haven't declared yet, that in London, which are all up and where therefore it's not just an expressive vote, you are actually going to change your council.